Rex et Regnum
by The Bitter Kitten
Summary: Being a Victor doesn't mean you've won.    OC, cameos and guest stars as the story permits.
1. We Pride Ourselves On Customer Service

He leaned against the doorway of the Capitol bedroom, a clean white towel wrapped around his hips and a warm mug of tea in his hands. The cold light from the hallway narrowed into a long stream that flowed across the floor and bed. Within it, his long, thin shadow was trapped. He stared at it for a while, thinking of all the different philosophical implications. He shifted, and the track of light fell across a figure in the bed. A petite brunette was tangled in the sheets. Her cherub's face was placid in sleep, perfect lips just parted, glossy tendrils of hair curling about pinked cheeks and down a porcelain, sculpted back. She was better than most, a well-balanced mix of coquettish experience and blushing reticence that could be cajoled away.

After a moment, he shoved his body off of the doorjamb, set his steaming mug on a nearby dresser, and climbed into bed behind her.

"Glinter... Glinter, wake up." He whispered in his best seductive tone, his now-minty breath tickling her ear. She stirred, and he repeated her name. She mumbled something softly. Her eyes fluttered open and stared sleepily into his, her voice hoarse with sleep.  
>"What time is it? I must have just drifted off, you wore me out. You brought me tea? How sweet! But it's still dark out..." She rolled onto her side and checked the clock. 0313 in the morning.<p>

"What's going on, Annek?"

Still in his seductive voice, a honey-coated, rolling bass, "You bought me for five hours, which started at ten sharp. You're thirteen minutes over and running swiftly through your generous twenty minute grace period. You have seven minutes to find whatever clothes you had and leave, or my rates double, and payment is due immediately. Seeing as I have more money than I know what to do with, get out."

She stared at him dumbly, uncomprehending.

"Six minutes."

"What?...But Annek, I thought we were.. and all the things you said..." She fumbled for the right words, sleep robbing her of eloquence. She rubbed her eyes and ran fingers through her tangled hair, trying to focus.

"You mean like, 'I've never felt this way before', and 'You're different', and 'I could stare into your eyes forever'?" He pulled a mocking face with each phrase.

She gaped at him, plush lips forming a near-perfect little O. "But... but you brought me back here!"

"Five and a half minutes," he said brightly, with a smile. Now he was a trainer, excitedly calling out times from a stopwatch.

He hit a small panel near the headboard and the overhead lights blazed to full intensity, making him squint and her shriek and cover her eyes with her hands, until he relented with a twinge of guilt and turned them down to a manageable level.

She scrambled out of bed, ripping the damp towel from him and clutching it to her dancer's body. She scurried here and there, trying to find her tunic, leggings, underthings and belt before her time ran out. Annek had tossed them all over the room out of spite. As she rushed, he lounged on the bed. Head propped up on one hand, hair dripping and skin damp from the shower he had luxuriated in, he watched her with a bitter smirk. Once found, she fumbled her way into her outfit. Dressed, she balled the stolen towel up and threw it at him. He caught it and returned it to its place over his hips.

"Oh look, two minutes left. I think that's a new record. Yaaay for you," he said, giving her a thumbs up.

" What? I.. You...You're horrible! Besides, you seemed to be enjoying yourself! And what are you going on about a … a price?" There was an odd, stricken look to her face. She still hadn't quite woken up yet, and Annek was pushing his luck. Still, he pressed on.

"Business is business, doll, and I always have satisfied customers. Leave the tea, it's mine."

Glinter gave an indignant squeak as she flushed tomato red. She picked up the cup and threw it onto the cold slate, tea and ceramic splashing everywhere, soaking into the bedsheets and scattering around the room. She stomped out, carrying her sandals. She tried to slam the door, but the hinges were made for preventing just that, and the wide doors closed with a quiet, hissing click.

Annek rolled onto his back, listening as the elevator dinged outside in the landing. He was light as air, still nursing a significant buzz from the evening's party, nerves jazzed from evicting a Patron in such a disgraceful fashion. A small part of his mind told him this was a very bad idea and he'd be paying for it soon, but for now he was reveling in this one small victory. Once he was sure she was gone, he climbed out of the sea of a bed, swaying a little, and flicked on the light. He pulled on some shorts from a drawer in a stately teak bureau, and set to work stripping the bed of all the heavy silken linens. His mood dropped almost as quickly as it rose. He hated, hated that he had to do this in his own bed. The jacquard duvet, cream-colored and soft, came off, then the deep hunter green down comforter, the top sheet, and finally the fitted sheet. He gathered it all into two piles in the middle of the room. With plain cotton sheets a sullen blue, he painstakingly remade the bed. Fitted sheet, pillows, top sheet, comforter and duvet, with crisp corners and perfectly positioned pillows. He turned off the light, climbed in again, and lay where Glinter had dozed off, feeling her warmth seep from the mattress. He shifted to a cold spot. Sleep would not come. He stared at the blank white ceiling, the previous night playing through his head.

-ReR-

At yet another Capitol soiree, he milled with other Victors and the bigger names of Panem. President Coriolanus Snow, with his white rose, and more sick-sweet perfume than any self-respecting Capitol woman. He avoided him studiously. There was Isabella Trinket, an escort for one of the other Districts. He always confused her with her sister Effie, who was standing beside her. Both were bubbly and rather photogenic, but it was Isabella who had the seamless artifice necessary to cheerfully condemn young boys and girls to their near-certain deaths. Effie still had something of a soul, it seemed. In large doses, both were completely insufferable. He wandered to the far end of the marble hall. A few of the hairdressers, stylists and other support staff of the Games were there fact-finding, trying to see the new fashions for the unfortunate new tributes in the upcoming Games. One in particular caught his eye. He obviously wasn't from the Capitol, as he wasn't dressed like a fop. He was handling himself remarkably well as opposed to the other fresh blood, who were out of hand with too much good wine: missing the effluvia bins tastefully placed around the buffet table, laughing too loudly at each others' jokes, standing too close to whomever they were talking to, spilling things everywhere, thrashing wildly to the quartet playing. Annek sidled up beside him, and they were soon engrossed in conversation, where he learned the man was a new hairstylist by the name of Cinna.

"So, what made you get involved in this whole sorry mess of things?" Annek asked after a while. Cinna had proven to be an adept conversationalist, and it didn't seem like such a ...sane person could want to be face-to-face with murder on a yearly basis and the excesses of the Capitol on a daily one.

"Quite frankly, the fact that most of the Tributes never stand a chance because of their prep team butchering their first presentation. I aim to be a stylist in a few years to remedy that."

Annek was taken aback, and it showed. Chatting up the support meant hearing the same sick spiel about 'eyes for fashion', 'new perspectives' and 'the Games being just delightful'. He never stayed to hear the rest.

"Of course, I have quite the eye for fashion, and I think these Games are the new runways of Panem." Cinna added, with a wink.

Annek had to laugh, and decided this hairdresser was one to watch. They watched the partiers, taking bets about who was going to commit what faux pas next. In spite of himself, Annek was beginning to enjoy the party, even if Cinna was making a tidy sum off of him.

Soon, however, he heard, or rather smelled, President Snow behind him. He turned quickly, smile in place. Snow was holding a glass of something that looked like champagne, but Annek couldn't tell.

"My dear Annek Alda." He had to raise his voice a bit to be heard over the din nearby, and they shifted a few paces away. Cinna took his leave with practiced ease, toasting Annek and melting back into the crowd.

"President Snow, it's such an honor to see you." His voice was carefully controlled.

"There's a guest here by the name of Glinter White, and you're just smitten with her."

"Is this lasting love, or just for the weekend?" Annek felt his face harden, and he did nothing to stop it. The smile stayed put, though.

"At least five hours, preferably all of tomorrow." He sipped his champagne and winced slightly, never taking his eyes off of the boy in front of him.

"We'll see where the night takes us." He said it flippantly, swirling the wine in his glass, not deigning to look up.

"I trust you will, Annek." Snow stared him down until Annek couldn't not look at him any longer, dragging his eyes up to meet Snow's rheumy gaze. He nodded, more of a jerk than actual agreement, and in a waft of nauseating stench, President Snow oozed off to another locale. Annek watched him leave, not quite daring to glare at his back. He hated being on probation, with President Snow menacing him every so often, making sure he stayed in line as he twisted the knife. It felt a little like he was a chained dog and Snow was trying to find an excuse to get rid of him.

He drained his glass of port, set it on the tray carried by a tuxedoed Avox, and grabbed another with a polite nod. He looked around the room for a Capitol girl who would have the silly District One name of Glinter. At least Four had proper names.

After sauntering and schmoozing his way around the hall, which was no small matter and took about an hour, he saw the last group of likely girls, a gaggle of socialites teetering on the edge of gluttony and drunkenness. He watched out of the corner of his eye, in a meaningless conversation with a sympathetic Victor.

"Look, Glinter, there he is! Go say hi!" A tall, statuesque girl with a literal waterfall of glossy, platinum blond hair said, smiling at him from behind a long, manicured hand. Annek was impulsively glad that Glinter wasn't blondie as he was momentarily fascinated by the mechanical, arcane magic of her hairstyle, trying to calculate how many extensions she had in to make the waterfall work as it did. Anyone who spent so much on an eight-hour style was either dumb as hell, or just starting out in the social scene and desperate to make an impression. The battery that powered it was already dying, and the churning river was slowing down to just a crawl.

"Shut up and stop staring, Shine! He'll see!" The shorter brunette punched the blonde in the arm, frantically glancing over at him. Annek breathed a small sigh of relief as he pretended to laugh at a joke. At least she took care of herself, unlike his last.

He drained half the glass of wine, nodded a goodbye to Jacques, who raised his glass in solidarity, and slid over. "So, who are we stalking? He better be cute."

Glinter gave a shrill squeak. Annek hid clenched teeth with a smile, praying that that wasn't a habit of hers.

"You, actually. Hi, uh, Mr. Alda, um, I'm Glinter White, and this is Shine, and this is Frill, and this is Ruffle, and this is Silk..." She rattled off her friends' names, and he tuned out until she was done.

"It's so nice to meet you all. Please, call me Annek." He held Glinter's gaze and her hand for two seconds longer than he should have.

They all chattered away for a while, and despite his best efforts, he learned that Glinter was a descendant of the Victor of one of the single-digit Games. Her family had made the move to the Capitol soon after she was born. She was eighteen, and today was her birthday. Eventually, her friends found ways to escape until it was just the two of them. He looked her over. Petite, dressed to the nines in the latest. Ancient Rome was in vogue, with goddess gowns and leather skirts for all. A blinding white toga-tunic with an intricate silver brooch, silver leggings, and gilded sandals crisscrossing her feet. Her chocolate hair was interwoven with silver i-cord, swept back, with bouncy ringlets framing her face.

"Do... do you like the view?" She giggled coyly.

"Quite a bit, actually. Just look at the Capitol, sprawling at our feet. Tonight, the world is ours." He turned melodramatically towards the wall of glass overlooking the city, a modern sea of multicolored lights.

"But it can't compare to the one right in front of me..." He said softly, rolling his eyes at his own overwrought speech.

She giggled again, putty in his hands. He was getting a bit irritated by it.

The conversation followed a similar vein, until he finally suggested they find someplace a little more private. He decided to take her on what he called the Grand Tour, which he had carefully scripted some time ago to make it easier on himself.

"Are you hungry?" He asked, knowing the answer. It was always "I could eat."

"Well, there's plenty here..." The uncertain response.

"I mean, doll, let's go find something more substantial than party food. I want you to myself for a while." He stared deeply into her starstruck eyes, willing himself to feel sensual. He consoled himself with the fact that she was rather pretty, and closer to his age than most. A little young for him yet, but he wasn't about to complain. Not after Kitty and her ancient skin so frail it felt like paper.

"Oh!" She was caught off-guard, double meaning finally sinking in. "Oh... is there any place open this late at night?" The restaurants on the boulevard stayed open well into the wee hours on Party Nights specifically for this purpose, but there was no need for her to know that.

"Probably, and if not, we could always... order in," he answered with an impish grin.

"The second one sounds like fun, let's do that!" He momentarily felt a spark of interest.

He led her on a circuitous route, stopping at the roof and hoping for inspiration from the night cityscape. Little was forthcoming.

They were silent for a while, taking in the sight and breeze, when Glinter spoke quietly, almost more to herself, full of reedy emotion.

"You know, I watched your Game, and I was rooting for you the whole time, from the very beginning. I even got my parents to pay for the extra footage of you. I mean, they kept switching away from you to focus on the other Tributes and I was so worried for you when those awful-"

"Glinter, doll, the Games are for discussing at a later time. They're not as interesting as you, but I'm... terribly flattered you cared for me that much." He fixed his gaze on the horizon and gripped the low stone wall. He tried to talk himself into it, convince himself he wanted her, but he felt nothing besides boredom and slight irritation. He wondered what Meghan was up to. Probably having dinner with her husband. He wasn't really sure what she did when she wasn't with him.

"And now I'm here with you, on the roof of the Tower, and I'm so happy." She was right next to him now, and looked up at him through her lashes, pressing her hips into his thigh, running a small hand up his side, letting it rest on his waist. He let her, forcing himself to stand still. He turned to look at her, and gave in. He stroked one rosy apple cheek and pulled her into a kiss, fighting the urge to break it and shove her away when she clung to him like peanut butter on the roof of his mouth. He hated the taste of her lipstick. Whatever brand it was was waxy and bitter, masked with too much fake blueberry flavoring. He wished he had more wine. It was always a little easier with wine.

~ReR~

0445. He slammed his head against the yielding pillow, ran a hand angrily through his mussed hair, threw off the too-hot linens. Padding softly on the freezing gray slate, he returned to the shower. Stripping off his boxers, he set the temperature as high as the computer would allow and stepped in. He supposed it was the added barb that he paid his dues for fame and fortune (as President Snow so euphemistically called it) in his own room, where he had to sleep. Never mind his dues were the slaughter of the twenty-three other tributes in the Fifty- Ninth Hunger Games, six by him. It was always there, just under the surface. Inescapable. The water was a degree shy of scalding, turning his tan skin a mottled red, stinging and smarting on the long scratches lovingly left by Glinter.

His life was over. He was twenty-one, and his life was over. Not that it was much of one to begin with, but still. He was a murderer of tribute and citizen alike. Directly responsible for the deaths of eleven people. Three were his family and friends. And two... he fell heavily against the long wall of the shower, sliding against the heated tile to the floor. He held his head in his hands. Curled against the wall in a miserable heap, he stayed there, hot water surrounding him, long after the shower stopped and the computer beeped the end of the cycle.


	2. Oh Hi, I Didn't See You There!

Frill met up with Glinter the next day for lunch, an afternoon of shopping, and all the sordid details of last night. They were settled in a window booth (the better to be seen) in a posh deli off the main drag downtown.

Glinter glared at Frill over her garden salad. "I'm not going to tell you. It was stupid."

"Are you kidding me? Glint, you spent the night with Annek Alda! Your life-long crush! How is that stupid?" Frill's normally nasal voice was even more pronounced with her irritation.

"Because he's a stupid, stuck-up idiot and I hate him and he should have died in his Games." She stabbed a tomato with her fork, pretending it was his fat face.

"What? He was crazy about you last night..."

"Yeah, well, he was faking. Or something. He was just weird. And stupid."

"Oh, come on. You can't give me something juicy like that and just stop, that's so district. Tell!" Frill's eyes were bright with interest.

Glinter sighed, and sipped her melon water. "Fine. But you can't tell anyone, alright? I'm still completely mortified."

"Not a soul." Frill pretended to zip her lips and toss the key.

"So, after you all left -thanks, by the way- he starts in on how pretty I am, and he hasn't met a girl like me, and just really sweet stuff. And then he's all 'I wanna get to know you' and 'let's go somewhere alone'. So we walk around for a while, and end up in his rooms. He has like, an entire floor to himself. We have this huge seafood dinner. Everything you can imagine. Lobster, crab, seabass, salmon, sushi, oysters. Everything, even sea cucumbers. I had to throw up twice, and it was amazing. So then we go into his bedroom, and -ugh!- it's gorgeous. I'd totally decorate mine like that, if he hadn't gone and ruined everything. Now I can't even see teak and chrome without thinking of his stupid face."

She paused and took a dainty bite of her salad, watching Frill, who was eating out of her hand. Perched on the edge of her seat, she leaned in. "So? You had dinner, then what?"

"Well, then we.. you know." She blushed and giggled and looked down at her salad.  
>"How was he?"<p>

"Way better than Harrick. I'm getting shivers just thinking about his fingers," She whispered conspiratorially.

"Then what's the problem? He likes you, you're crazy about him, you had a good time..." Frill searched Glinter's face for an answer.

"He wakes me up at friggin' three in the morning and tells me to get out or I have to pay him double or something. He acted like everything was a big, fat joke or whatever and just kicks me out! I had to call Daddy at three in the morning to send an Avox to come get me. I mean, I was so glad the party was still on, or I just wouldn't have gone home and said I'd been with you. I feel like such an idiot for believing him." Glinter flipped her hair with the back of her hand, still nonplussed at her callous dismissal.

"Wow. I didn't know they were so strict on the end. I would have gotten you more time if I'd known. He didn't seem like he'd be so rude, though. Weird. I guess I'll have to complain." Instead of scandalized, Frill looked thoughtful.  
>Glinter looked up sharply. "What the hell are you talking about, Frill?" She was more than a bit irritated her woeful tale was met with such apathy.<p>

"Well, I didn't want to tell you until later, but the girls and I wanted to give you something good for your birthday, and we decided to give you your crush. He cost a literal fortune, too. We had to give them like, 5,000 gold just for the night. Did you know that some rich losers rent the Victors out for weeks on end, just to have company? It's crazy."

"You... you bought him?"

"Well, rented is more like it, but yeah." Frill sipped her lemonade through the swirly straw.

Glinter was silent, stunned.

"Don't tell me you didn't know..." Frill had the upper hand, and she was gloating, a smile spreading across her face.

"No, Frill, I didn't know that you basically paid him to sleep with me! God, I feel like such a fool." Glinter turned beet red. She pushed her salad away and hid her face in her hands, turning as red as the nail polish she wore.

"Oh, honey, don't feel bad." Frill laid a hand on her arm, neon pink glitter tips twinkling softly. "He probably likes you better than some ancient cow making him walk her dogs or something. And anyway, I'll complain. That's not how it's supposed to go down, I've heard."

"Have you ever...?" Glinter was curious.

"Rented a Victor? Oh god, no. He's cute, but it's way too expensive. We could only afford him because we pooled up our gift money. And saved for half a year. Because we expect similarly big things for our birthdays! Mine's in three months, better start soon." She ended with a laugh, but Glinter was sure she was serious.

"So how did you find out about renting them? It's so.. I don't know, skeevy." Glinter looked uncomfortable.

"Shine overheard her dad talking about it with someone from his board a while back. Basically, you talk to Alyssa, who works the front desk at the Tower, and she takes the requests, I guess. They sign themselves up for it, though, so don't feel bad. Alyssa told me that most of them have spent themselves silly after winning the Games because they come from the Districts and don't really know what to do with themselves. So they do it to keep up the lifestyle. It's kinda sad, actually."

"He only won two years ago, how could he have spent everything so fast?"

"He is from District Four..."

"True."

The waitress stopped by and refilled their glasses. "Can I get you two anything?"

"No, we're fine. Just the check." Glinter turned back to Frill. "You know what? I'm gonna go see him."

"Glint, um, I don't think that's how it works..." Frill was trying to find a tactful way to discourage Glinter, but words were never her strong point.

"I know where his rooms are. I just want to see if he's really like how he was last night, or if he remembers my name or anything. Who knows, maybe I'll get your money back. Or an apology." She smirked.

"Well, then, I'm gonna go get that dress we looked at. I'll be waiting for you near the Fountain, but don't do anything stupid. He probably has a ton of fangirls trying the same thing, and if you get caught, I've never seen you before."

Glinter scribbled her father's name and account number on the bill and left. They walked out into the bright afternoon sun and went their separate ways.

~ReR~

Annek woke up shivering in a puddle of icy water to the quiet rustlings of the Avox picking up towels and the cast off clothing from last night on the other side of the bathroom. Stiff all over, and in the shower. His head throbbed painfully with every move, and he felt a rush of vertigo as he sat up. His throat was painfully dry and his teeth felt like they were covered in thick, sour wool. He spat bile, half-expecting dust. He went through this after every party, and every time he promised himself never again. He stumbled to his feet, nearly knocking over the glass of water the Avox had set on the lip of the shower, and punched in the code for a painkiller and a shot of vodka on the bathroom's console. Nothing like the hair of the dog that bit you. The screen dinged. **Error 34C9: Alcohol contraindicated with opioids. Please revise your request and enter again.** No harm in trying, he supposed. He sighed, and reentered the painkiller. Aiming for a bureau, he tripped on the pile of bedsheets in the middle of the floor and landed with a thud on his face, bare skin skidding across the slate. The Avox came running from the bath, terror written across his face. Annek groaned and waved him off.  
>"Don't worry, it's my fault. Just keep on, yeah?"<br>Relief flooded the gaunt man. He rushed back to the bath to finish and swiftly made his escape. Annek lay there for a good several minutes, hoping the throbbing would ease, then picked himself up slowly, noting minor scrapes and the quickly forming dark purple-gray bruise under his right eye. Perhaps it was time to change to some softer flooring. He slipped on underwear, a pair of silk pajama pants, and some ridiculously fuzzy slippers to warm his feet. He shuffled over to the kitchen, where he found a newly-present pill and fresh glass of water. He checked the clock: 1500. He was making better-than-average time today; usually it was at least 1545 before he woke up. The only good thing about party nights was he had the next day to himself to recover. Mustn't look drained or peaked, after all. He tried to remember the events, and realized with a suddenly sinking stomach that yes, he really did curse a blue streak and throw a Patron out on her bum in a drunken fit of pique, and no, he hadn't invited her back in.

He had made a big mistake last night. So big it was like a deep burn: he didn't feel anything yet, didn't recognize the pain, but it was coming, and more than he could imagine. Everything was supposed to be as if it were natural. No surprise reveal, no evictions. Even though both people knew what was going on, he had to keep up the pretense. If that girl complained, he'd be in for a world of hurt, especially since he was still, after a year, on probation from the first one. How could he have been so stupid? He stuffed the thought to the back of his mind as he washed the pill down with cool water. Time would tell, and there was precious little he could do about it now.  
>He checked the calendar. Tomorrow he had an interview with Caesar Flickerman, part of a series on the Victors. "Behind the Arena: Life after the Games". He sighed again. Should be painless, if tedious. Similar title, same questions every year.<p>

Quick, soft knocks on the door startled him. Avoxes didn't knock. They were supposed to be all but invisible. And "his" had already come and gone. He wasn't expecting any visitors, not that there were many people he cared to see. Anyone important came with a 15-minute lead for him to compose himself. He snuck from the kitchen to the door, more curious than paranoid. He opened it, looked around. Shock slowly overtook curiosity, and he slammed the door, which closed quietly despite the considerable force behind it. He crossed to the closet, pulled on a plain cotton shirt, kicked off his slippers and returned to the living room. His mind raced. The girl from last night? Why was she here? Did she forget something? He looked around. He didn't see anything feminine or not-his. If she had complained, she wouldn't be here, Snow or Alyssa would. How did she even get past security? Hell, how did she even remember which floor was his? Did he misremember the time he had to spend? No, it was just for a few hours. He remembered that part clearly enough, even if the rest was dim. He wondered for a while, until it came to him that she was probably still standing outside. He glanced around, kicked the pile of sheets from last night into the gargantuan closet and closed the door. He checked himself in the mirror (presentable, if water-logged) and ran over. He cracked the door, and she was still there, staring confusedly at him.

"Um, hi?" His words were quick from nerves.

"Hi..." she replied, uncertain.

"This, uh... this may come as an obvious question, but what are you doing here, exactly?" He blinked.

"I... well..." She fumbled for words, and looked up as his eyes searched her face. "I want the truth about last night."

Annek closed the door again, and cursed under his breath. One of these again. Mistook spending the night with him as a sign they were written in the stars as lovers or some drivel. He had to fix his stupidity from last night, though. He gathered himself, resigned to the fact his (well-earned) lazy day was gone.

He swung the door wide open, and miming a butler, ushered her in with a bow and a smile.

"Then the truth you'll have. Do come in."

She hesitated for a moment, and then walked into the living room. He gestured to a plush armchair, and she plopped down, carefully smoothing her skirt as she crossed her legs, her flip-flop slapping rhythmically against her heel. At least she was anxious too. He took the one across the low coffee table.

After a few awkward pleasantries, he steeled himself again.

"What truth are you dying to know?" The question hung in the air for a long moment.  
>"What... why did you do what you did? And my friend told me about buying you, so I want the real truth, not whatever you're supposed to say." She asked quietly, almost afraid to hear the answer, it seemed.<p>

He was silent for quite a while, mulling over the choices. He could tell her the whole truth. That he was bought and sold like so much meat to whoever came up with enough crumpled bills to line Snow's formidable pockets. That he did so under threat of his loved ones being slaughtered at the first hint of reluctance or rebellion. That it had happened once before, and he had no intention of repeating those terrible days.

"Well?"

He swallowed hard. "Because, doll, fossilized ivory inlaid into pure marble and traced with 24 karat gold costs truly heinous amounts of money, and I am a slave to fashionable things." He willed her to buy the lie.

"Bull." His heart sank.

"What, you don't believe me? I don't look like a couture hound?" He held her gaze as he opened his arms and gestured to their surroundings.

"Stop it. If you were so in love with fossilized gold or whatever, you could buy it. You told me you had more money than you knew what to do with. So I'm giving you one last chance to tell me why you're selling yourself, or I'm going to complain." She pursed her lips and folded her arms.

"A mind for details. Intriguing." He was nearly in a full-on panic, casting about how he could salvage this. Of all the stupid patrons he had to piss off, it was the one who wouldn't shut up until she got what she wanted.

He took a deep breath, resigned to his fate.

"It's easier if you go blow-by-blow if you want my reasons for things. The evening is a bit fuzzy. I'll tell you as much as I can." He could really, really use a drink about now.

"Why did you pick me?" An easy enough question to begin with.

"Because I was told to."

"What did you think when you found me?"

"You could have been worse, and I was glad it wasn't your blonde friend."

"You mean Frill? What's wrong with Frill?" Glinter's girlish ire for her friend sparked, and he held up his hands in protest.  
>"Nothing's wrong with Frill, I just don't usually spring for blondes." He mentally kicked himself. This wouldn't be nearly as hard if he would just stop shoving his foot in his mouth with every sentence.<p>

"Did you feel anything at all? Or was everything an act?" He stifled a groan. Everyone assumed that theirs was magic and when they woke up in the morning, he'd be in sopping wet love with them and forget all about how they'd paid good money to sleep with him.

"Most of it was an act." He blurted the words in exasperation before he could couch it in flattery.

"Then what parts weren't?" She took it in stride and he was caught off guard, struggling to come up with an answer.

"Well... you're not a dull shag." While true, it was not the sort of flattery she was looking for, and it showed.

"...Oh."

"And... I mean, you're intelligent and can hold a conversation, and you are -really- flexible, so the evening was rather enjoyable, all things considered." He fought the urge to smack himself, willing his head to stop throbbing so he could think clearly and make it out of this alive.

She seemed satisfied that he labeled her as a cut above the rest, and settled back into her chair, allowing her skirt to ride up, showing him a flash of neon blue. Annek stared steadfastly at her face.

"So, who was your best?" Sooner or later, it always came back to how they measured up, and he knew he was home free.

"That, to respect the privacy of my very generous patrons, I will not divulge." He wasn't supposed to name names, and regardless, it was all one sorry mess he didn't want to dignify by ranking.

"Tell me, or I'll complain!" He wondered vaguely if she would throw a fit if he egged her on enough, but he reigned himself in.

"Listen, uh, Glisten, you can complain all you like, but I can't tell you."

"Glint**er**," she corrected.

"Right, sorry. But you really should go. I've got meetings all day and I'm already late." He stood up, and she followed suit, tugging down her skirt. "And please don't show up unannounced again. It's not wise." There was nothing against it, but the last thing he wanted was for this to become a routine.

"I'm sorry Annek, but I had to know." She looked appropriately contrite.

"I understand. I hope you'll forgive my rudeness last night. You're a lovely girl and I was completely out of line."  
>He was warming up to the task now, finally slipping into his public face.<p>

"You're forgiven. Just don't do it again." She smiled coyly, and looked at him from beneath her lashes.  
>This was not the response he was looking for.<p>

As she walked out the door, she paused, then turned back and threw her arms around him. He froze for a long second, then gingerly hugged her back, not knowing what else to do. She broke the embrace and hurried out the door as he stared after her.  
>Annek closed the door, then leaned on it, running a hand across his forehead. The stress combined with the hangover was creating a fearful migraine, already breaking through the feeble wall of the first pill. His vision was beginning to swim and pinpricks of light flashed. The small reserve of energy he had was utterly drained, and he felt himself beginning to sweat. He should probably eat something, but he didn't have the stomach for it. He ordered another painkiller, drew the light-blocking shades and crawled under the clean, heavy sheets.<p>

So much for today.


	3. Smile, Step, Repeat

Annek slouched like a lump in his chair, arms folded, staring balefully at his stylist, Meghan.

"I'm not wearing that."

Fiery eyes pierced him. "Annek, are you saying you don't trust my judgment?"

He broke the staring contest first, eyes flickering to the side, before he settled on the tiny piece of skin above her nose and between her eyes, faking meeting her gaze. "No..."

"Then exactly what message are you trying to send by refusing to wear what I've picked out for you?"

"I'm not trying to send anything! I just hate them. I feel like I'm in a costume. And it looks ridiculous. Why can't I just wear this?" He gestured to his cargo shorts and plain black shirt.

"It _is _a costume. And you can't go on with Caesar Flickerman dressed like you are now. You'd be a laughingstock."

Yeah, well I'd be a comfortable laughingstock," he groused.

Meghan tapped her foot impatiently. "You're on in thirty minutes. I will give you exactly five, before I dress you myself."

Annek considered his options. Meghan was not to be fooled with, and she was just itching to use what she called "force". He could endure the heavy leather armor for the show, at least.

"Do you have to do the make-up?" He whined.

"For the last time, Annek. I pick what is on trend and will present you in the best light, and I try to accommodate your abominable taste when I can. But you can't lose your reputation, so just put the damn thing on and let me do my job."

"Fine. But you're the one who started all this nonsense to begin with." He heaved a sigh, and reluctantly changed into the gladiator suit and sandals. He felt silly as he slouched back into the chair, a petulant soldier.

"It was a stroke of genius and you know it," said Meghan. He couldn't really argue that. After all, he was one of the most prominent Victors of late, and his and Doe's Presentation (and his subsequent win, of course) had sparked this style.

A cloud of hairspray and makeup whirled around him. Hands prodded and pulled, dabbed and rubbed and lined. He hissed when a poking pinch landed on the bruised cheekbone from his fall yesterday. When the team finished and turned him to face the vanity, he was nearly gilt. His hair was artfully windswept, a scintillating mix of glossy mohogany and burnished gold. Smoky black eyeliner rimmed his green eyes, making them flash deep and bright. Gold lipstick. Heavy bronzer. Bold bands of copper and gold circled his arms and fingers. He looked like a demi-god, glowing and benevolent.

"What did you do to me?" He reached a tentative hand to his face as he stared horrified in the mirror, only to have it slapped away by Meghan.

"I had to cover that bruise on your face somehow. It hasn't finished setting yet, and you're due up now. Don't touch."

He stood still. "It reminds me too much of the Games." His voice was flat.

"I'm sorry, Annek, but that's kind of what you're known for. We have to remind people who you are and what you did, or you'll get upstaged with each new Victor, and then where will you be?" Her voice was soft, and a bit sad.

He smiled ruefully back at the tiny stylist. "What would I do without you?"

"Make a fool of yourself in front of all of Panem. Now go!" And she shooed him away.

Annek walked to his mark on the platform below the stage, armor clinking lightly, leather squeaking, listening to the murmuring crowd above him. Apparently, this never got old for them, even though it was the same few Victors asked the same few questions every time.

He heard Caesar announcing him, muffled through the stage:

"Ladies, lock up your daughters and keep a firm grip on your hearts! Our next guest is the heartthrob from District Four, our very own Poseidon, Annek Alda!"

The platform rose slowly, and as he appeared on stage, the crowd erupted into a deafening roar of catcalls, cheers, oohs and ahhs. He was momentarily blinded by the lights and flash, but kept his practiced grin until his eyes adjusted. He winked and blew a kiss to a redhead in the front row, who caught it and sent one of her own. He pretended to catch it and hold it over his heart. He couldn't pick out her voice, but he watched her as she squealed and turned to her friend beside her, ecstatic.

Caesar stood up as Annek made his way over to him, and wrapped him in a bear hug. They made a big show of checking that their makeup hadn't transferred onto each other. Caesar was as golden as Annek, it being his choice for this year's Games, and it wouldn't have showed anyway.

Annek took his seat, lounged comfortably in it, and smiled at the crowd, which was finally calming down. He turned indulgently to Caesar, waiting for the questions.

"Annek Alda," Caesar said, enunciating every syllable, "How does it feel to be a Victor?"

"It's... really amazing." Annek grinned widely, looking out over the crowd. "It's a lottery. The stakes are high, but if you win, there's nothing else like it in Panem. I have everything I could wish for. Beautiful birds for days -a loud cheer from the audience, and Annek paused until he could be heard again- my family is taken care of, I get to rub shoulders with the elite, as many parties as I can stand... fame, fortune, women, it's all mine, and I wouldn't trade it for the world. I guess I've done pretty well for a boy from District Four." He looked down. He seemed overwhelmed by his good fortune, and the sighs from the crowd told him they were eating out of his hand.

The conversation continued on in this vein for a surprising length of time, reveling in his exploits of the Games, Annek retelling the tale with animated gestures, hitting the dramatic beats perfectly, as he'd rehearsed. They talked the latest fashions, shows, and parties, Annek reading from a teleprompt.

Finally, Caesar turned to the upcoming Games. "Now Annek, as we all know, you have a younger brother Marcus. Are you worried about his name being drawn, now that he's turning twelve?"

"You know, Caesar, it's been weighing on me a bit. Of course I don't want to lose him. But I do believe the odds are in his favor, and even if his name is drawn, he has me and Mags to help him prepare, so really, he can't lose." This brought a lot of sighs, and a few laughs, but it was vaguely uncomfortable for the audience, and Caesar deftly steered the conversation away from any real depth.

"Is there any special lady you want to say hi to right now?" Caesar prodded. Annek laughed with a knowing smile. "Why, of course, Caesar. She means the world to me, and I'd do anything for her. She knows who she is... hi Mom! I'm coming to visit soon!" He waved to the camera, and the crowd exploded. If there was one thing they loved more than a district boy done good, it was a boy who loved his mother.

"Well folks, that's all the time we have with Annek -disappointing, I know-, but we'll see him again soon!"

Annek rose swiftly. He and Caesar clasped hands. Annek walked over to his mark on the moving platform, blew another kiss to the redheaded girl, and slowly disappeared into the floor. As he did, he could hear Caesar moving on with the same breathless intensity to the next Victor. "Our next guest is the butterfly Phoebe..." The sound-damping cover clicked shut flush with the stage and muffled he rest of Caesar's sentence. He wasn't really listening anyway. He stepped off the platform and wiped his face with his hands, smearing eyeliner and mascara. Another one down. He was dreaming of his bed and about two fingers of scotch as he made his way back to his dressing room.

Meghan met him in the underground corridor, and gave him a hug. "See? That wasn't so bad. And I have a present for you just to make it up to you."

"Oh really?" A real smile lit up his Annek's face.

"I got you a Question and Answer Session." Meghan seemed pleased as punch with herself.

"This is supposed to be a gift?" His eyes narrowed. Q and As were worse than interviews with Caesar. It was basically a meet and greet with random people who could ask whatever they wanted, usually about the Games. Staying on Capitol-approved points was hard at the best of times, but televised, "unscripted" sessions were the worst. There was always someone to screw things up.

"Well, you don't even know where it is!" She was unfazed at his skepticism.

"District Four?" His voice was soft, not daring to hope.

"Mhmm." Meghan's face broke into a broad grin.

Annek hugged her and swung her around in a circle, giddy with joy.

"Meghan you're the best, I could kiss you!" He planted one on her forehead, leaving a golden lip print. He hadn't been back to his home in a year and a half, and he was ecstatic.

"You're coming with me, right? When is it?"

"It's not until Wednesday next week, but we'll be leaving by train the day after tomorrow and staying until Thursday."

Annek couldn't believe his luck. Usually it was a fly-by-night affair in other Districts, arriving moments before the Q and A and leaving directly after, but he had twelve whole days at home.

He didn't speak for a moment, but when he did, his voice was rough with emotion.

"Meghan, in all of this, you're the best thing that's happened to me. Thank you."

"You just remember that the next time you start pouting about my outfits," she smirked.

"I'll see you on the train." Annek hugged her one last time for good measure, and went to change back into normal clothes.

He walked back to the Tower in a daydream, thinking of home and who he'd find there.


	4. Nothing Less Than Exactly What You Want

He walked back from the television studio, lost in his thoughts behind sunglasses, hands shoved deep into his pockets, deep brown leather satchel swinging gently with his gait. The city was overcast today and the glasses were unnecessary, but it kept most people from recognizing him, and he pretended he never saw the rest.

He hadn't been home for a year and a half, and he'd left so suddenly. No goodbye to anyone, not his family, not his friends. Just Lina, and that hadn't been worth it; she'd assumed he was cashing in on his new-found fame and broke up with him on the spot. It was at the end of a slow and painful death anyway, and he hadn't felt much one way or the other.

He thought about what he'd say to his sister. Eighteen months of checks and not a single word would be hard to explain. The discrepancy in technology was disheartening the more he thought about it, so he didn't often. Soon after the Dark Days, the Capitol decided the Districts (and to a lesser but still draconian extent, its own citizens), couldn't be trusted with anything other than official, government-run channels of communication. Thus, there were no telephones, no independent television channels; there were only three. One was a never ending loop of propaganda, public service announcements, and "educational" updates and programs on the Districts that were wholesale lies. One was a Hunger Games marathon, looping every single Game ever played, complete with highlights, comparisons, interviews and presentation ceremonies, all breathlessly recapped with the hissing Capitol accent. The last was a channel primarily for the Capitol, though a choice few Districts had access every month, just to see what they were missing: twenty-four-hour advertisements and infomercials of everything vapid, shallow and distracting, from five hundred-carat diamond necklaces, to the newest trends in fashions and the most enviable restaurants, shows and performances. There were no videolinks, no computers, no internet, nothing that served the failed rebellion. Even cameras were rare, and painfully expensive, even for him. That left letters, which were read and ruthlessly censored before they ever left the Tower, and required hefty bribes for each hand it passed through to reach wherever it was intended. So Annek stuck to bills carefully wrapped in paper and stuffed in an envelope, with every bribe labeled neatly and wrapped around more paper. Each month, it bought food and clothes and more than took care of his older sister and younger brother, and left some to help out as the need arose. If there was one good thing, his family (or what was left of it) was taken care of.

He turned down the avenue to the Plaza, and passed by Jeweler's Row, a collection of stores stuffed with the latest bits and baubles. The glittering wares caught his eye, and he was struck with an idea that made him smile. Not only because he could thank Meghan, but surprise her in a good way for once, and he intended to keep her on her toes. He turned in to the third shop on the left, and flagged down a salesman in a fluorescent orange tuxedo and yellow hair.

Six shops of various merchandise later, Annek was laden with bags hanging from every usable inch of him and he felt a little like a pack mule. He contemplated having them sent on by the shop's Avox but he wanted to resist the mind-numbing, conscience-deadening effect of the Capitol as much as possible, so he soldiered on. He staggered into the lobby of the Tower, the glistening, eighty-story skyscraper that housed the Victors during the Games or year-round, as their situation dictated. As he passed the front desk, Alyssa Twik called out to him, in that grating, sugary-sweet voice of hers:

"Ooh, shopping! I hope some of that's for me!"

Annek rolled his eyes and passed without comment. He had learned early on that the less said to her, the better.

The quiet, lightning fast elevator opened onto a spacious, well-lit landing with a domestic vignette in the corner: a reading chair and accompanying lamp on a table, a small woolen rug and a painting on the wall. It was the most useless bit of fluff. He never used it, and no one was waiting outside his door long enough to, either.

He tapped twice and swiped his hand on the door, which beeped cheerfully and swung open. Hands- free entry was useful in more ways than the usual one.

The door opened onto a vast sitting room, with three clusters of varying intimacy and a small, recessed, glass covered pond. It was filled with delicate, mottled silver, gold, and pewter fish, fins trailing in the crystal clear water, darting behind algae covered rocks and sea grasses. Off to the left, the bedroom suite complete with roaring fireplace; to the right, a spacious kitchen and dining room, filled with every possible gadget and fine china. Annek was not a bad cook, but it was used only when a Patron demanded a romantic, home-cooked meal. It was too lonely otherwise. A weight room was off the dining room. A personalized gym. He always enjoyed walking in alone. He has gotten to redecorate when he had moved in, and it was all calming blues and forest greens, placid sand, black-brown teak and shining chrome. The best part was floor to ceiling windows in nearly every room, which went from clear as air, to one-way, to smoked-out gray with the Dashboard.

He staggered into the bedroom and threw the presents and wrapping paper down onto the bed, crisply made by his Avox. He cringed, and resolved to get to it earlier so the Avox wouldn't have to again.

Wrapping would be a welcome distraction and he settled in to his task: measuring, cutting, wrapping, re-wrapping, labeling. Two hours later, he was finished, and he turned his attention to packing in earnest.

Twelve whole days back home, with no Patrons, no parties, no Snow, just his family and friends and one little hour for Capitol business was beginning to sink in.

He felt that fifteen minutes of packing was long enough and he had earned a break. He surveyed his work. The room was utter chaos. Suitcases dotted the bed and the floor with clothes haphazardly piled in and around them. Snippets and shreds of wrapping paper and ribbons were sprinkled everywhere. Every drawer was pulled out, stripped of its contents, which either lay near the suitcases or was scattered merrily about the bedroom. He couldn't figure out what he needed to bring, what would be too ostentatious, or what would be there at home already. He had just called down for lunch, when he heard an oddly familiar knock at the door. He paused, head cocked, and she knocked again. He glanced around the room (fit for no eyes but his own), and sighed. This girl had the worst timing. He thought about closing the glass french doors to the bedroom and smoking them out, but he considered it a lost cause with a sigh and went to answer the door and her third knock.

"Hello?"

"Er, um, hi Annek! I was... in the neighborhood and thought I might come by. Is it all right?"

"There's a neighborhood on the fiftieth floor of the Tower?" He tried to make a joke, but it came out much more sharply than he wanted, and Glinter flinched.

"I'm really sorry, I can come back another time-"

"No, no, it's okay, you just caught me off-guard, is all. What's up?"

"Well, I wanted to apologize for barging in on you the last time, and you always say you like chocolate chip cookies in your interviews, so I made you some." She lifted a truly gigantic platter of cookies. Some spelled out a delicate, spindly SORRY in white icing, complete with sad smiley face. None of them looked appetizing, especially considering their source.

"Wow, um, you_ really_ didn't have to do this, but thank you!" Annek gingerly took the platter as Glinter peered around him.

"Can I come in?"

"Uh... sure?" He stepped aside. He didn't know where this was going, but he wasn't too fond of it.

Glinter meandered in and out of the bedroom, looking wide-eyed at the trashed apartment, as Annek set the platter on a nearby coffee table.

"Going somewhere?"

"Yeah, I killed a man, and I'm leaving under cover of night," he deadpanned.

Glinter stared, uncomprehending. "Really?"

"...It was a joke..." Annek sighed.

She flushed slightly, and he softened. "I'm going to District Four for a while."

She looked crestfallen, but he had no idea why.

"It's only for a week and a half," he said, finding himself placating her.

She brightened. "Oh that's perfect! I actually came over to ask you if you wanted to go to dinner and see a play with me that Saturday you get back."

Annek felt his stomach do a curious flip-flop-drop and began thinking of new and inventive curses. "I have to make sure I don't have any Capitol business that day, but I don't think it's a good idea."

"Come on, it'll be fun! It's my treat, so you don't have to worry about it. Please? I'll even talk to Daddy and see if you can have that day off."

Annek hesitated. Clearly, this girl was determined to carve a place for herself in his life. He couldn't outright reject her, but he really had no interest in romance or anything remotely related to it.

Glinter, sensing he was nearly hers, gave him her best puppy-dog plea, brown eyes glistening, lips just trembling. "I understand if you don't want to. I know I'm not as pretty as some of the girls you're with, and you probably already have a girlfriend. But it's just dinner and a play, and I think we could hit it off if you just gave me a chance. Besides, we've already had-"

Annek laughed, but it wasn't happy. He'd realized suddenly that he was painted into a corner and the only way out was in her favor. "You've got me. I'll go out with you the Saturday I get back, if I don't have business."

Glinter beamed up at him, surprised him with a quick, ardent kiss on her tiptoes, and scurried out the door before he could react.

"I'll see you Saturday! Have fun in Four!" echoed down the hall as she raced away.

Annek looked back at his room as he wiped his mouth. Suddenly, packing wasn't as fun, and he went about the long process of putting things back in order, hurling clothes about in frustration. His food arrived. He motioned for the Avox to set it on a small clean spot on the bed, where it steadily grew colder, ignored.

~ReR~

Glinter, however, was elated. She had just swung a date, and now had good reason to shop for a new party dress. A few quick calls, and she spent the rest of day reinventing her considerable wardrobe with Shine and Frill in yet another shopping marathon.

"You went to see him _again_? Glinter, he's gonna think you're insane." Frill was excited, but not for Glinter, exactly. She could sense a scandal like a shark could smell blood, and being this close to the epicenter of what was sure to be a messy drama was electrifying.

"Wait, again? We only paid once, right? Was there a sale?" Shine didn't shine too brightly, and Glinter and Frill gave her a gloss-over. "Wow, that must have been awful, you should complain or something."

Glinter reminded herself as she took a few calming breaths that if she wanted the perks of Shine's connections, she'd have to endure her company, and she promised to treat herself later to make up for it.

"Yeah I was going to, but like I already said, he was really sorry about it, said I was better than most and that he wanted to make it up to me." Glinter was trying on a deep navy floor-length number, slinky, with deep cleavage. Frill nodded approvingly, while Shine was less enthused.

"You think he actually likes you?"

"I don't know yet. Like, I think maybe? He liked the cookies, though." A sky-blue dress with a circle skirt and puffed sleeves twice the size of her head drew no love from either.

"You brought him cookies?" Shine was still processing a few subjects back. Frill was handing her a burnt orange frock, with a high neckline and a shorter hem.

"Shine, god, keep up. I brought them to apologize for putting him on the spot. They were his favorites." She modeled, to approving nods.

"Besides," she said, playing her trump card, "I'm going out with him Saturday after next, his treat."

"Shut up!" in earsplitting unison.

All three girls squealed, and the search redoubled. Glinter walked out with the navy dress, the orange one, a red silk sheath and a growing excitement.


	5. It's Only Lonely If You Try

The train taking them to District Four was comfortable and quiet. Even though it was a ground model and not a more modern hovertrain, it was opulent. A private block of cars were set aside for Meghan, the team, and him outfitted with plush, king-sized beds in spacious, ornamented rooms; a personal chef churning out gourmet meals like clockwork... if Annek weren't so excited about getting back to Four, he'd have liked to stay on the train for much longer than the two-dayish ride.

He wandered from his car into the dining room in the early afternoon. He ignored the dirty look Meghan gave him for keeping her waiting. He had woken up to board the train at some obscene hour so they wouldn't reach Four in the middle of the night, and he felt he deserved his beauty rest. Especially since he had to decide what to do about Glinter.

He plopped down into a chair across from her and loaded his plate with everything he could reach. In between mouthfuls of lunch, he caught up on where they were (nearly through Two; they'd arrive before noon the next day) and pestered Meghan about opening her presents.

"I bought you enough that you could open one every day and you'd still have one left when we get back, but you're throwing off the entire schedule. You should be ashamed. So much thought from me -from me- just wasted." He was passionate with righteous indignation, even if it was rather exaggerated.

"Is all this really necessary, Annek? You know I don't like flashy things, and if I start wearing the kind of things you like to give me, people will talk." Even though she was reprimanding him, it sounded like she was rather approving.

Annek pressed on. "I don't give a damn what people think. You're amazing for swinging this and I want to show my appreciation the only way I know how: with expensive gifts and a decided lack of taste."

Meghan rolled her eyes. "But who has to put out your fires, hm?"

"No one. My fires are warm and cozy and you secretly love them."

"Fine. I'll open one every day, but I can't promise I'll do anything besides that. You'll be lucky if I don't throw the whole lot out the window."

Annek soft-balled a roll at her. She caught it and flung it back without missing a beat. It splashed into a tureen of broccoli-cheddar soup, speckling what little food wasn't on Annek's plate with tiny dots of green, sending them both into a mad fit of giggles after a beat of silence.

As he recovered himself, he said "Anyway, I need your advice. Nothing world-ending, but I need your perspective."

Meghan grew serious. Annek was fiercely independent, given the circumstances, and the more he could rely on himself, the happier he was. For him to suddenly ask for help meant either he had another overzealous fan, or he was considering the unthinkable.

"Annek, you know you can't get involved with anyone. It would just be plain selfish of you to put them at such risk. Don't give him more targets than he already has for you." Her voice dropped to a hissing whisper, as if the President himself were leaning in the doorway, listening.

He pulled a face. "There's no one like that, and trust me, I've learned my lesson. It's just...I...I messed up."

Meghan was on the edge of her seat, concern etched in her face. "Annek, what happened, how long ago, and why haven't you told me sooner?"

He took a deep breath, fingering his water glass, and filled her in.

"I'm pretty sure she knows I can't really say no to her because she can just complain, but... it's worse than just a regular Patron. If I had just put up with it for a few more hours, or even just left and let her leave whenever she woke up..." He trailed off and pinched the bridge of his nose, and when he spoke again, he was defeated. "Why am I so stupid, Meghan?"

"Annek..." Meghan had come around to his side of the table, and put her arms around him. She didn't have any children (but she was only thirty-three, there was still time), but she felt a familiar surge of maternal instinct. She had taken him under her wing, cared for him like he was her own. He was, in his own way; he was her first Tribute to survive, out of nine.

"It'll be all right. You're not stupid. Silly, sometimes, of course, but no one can blame you for this." She gripped his chin gently, lifting his head. "Look at me." Annek met her eyes, his expression inscrutable.

"It sounds like she's got a crush on you. Which is fine. Half the Capitol does. It's nothing you haven't dealt with before. Your problem isn't to get to her to stop liking you, but to make it so she can't complain and have a leg to stand on. Which, granted, is hard. But doable."

"Right... so what do I do?"

"Make her realize she doesn't want to be attached to you. How old is she?" Meghan was thoughtful as she sat down.

"Sixteen? No, Eighteen. I think. Young, I know that much."

"So she's a socialite?"

"Er, yeah. I'd never really noticed her at the parties before that night, though."

"Hmm. The key here is to let her break things off. If she's young and and just getting into the scene, she's probably angling to use you as leverage. She'd be someone to be reckoned with, because she's got Annek Alda wrapped around her little finger, right?"

"Right..." He shifted a bit, rather uncomfortable with the notion.

"So, follow her lead, but be... dull. She's young, so she wants to have fun and be seen. If you're no fun to be around, she'll move on to someone else soon enough, like maybe Jacques, or just some wealthy Capitol boy ."

"Oh... yeah, that makes s,ense." A little light clicked on in Annek's head. "Meghan, have I told you lately that I love you?" The small, dark cloud that had been hanging over him for the past few days was beginning to lift.

"Why, yes, you have, Annek. And I love you too." She said earnestly, full of warmth.

They finished lunch, and went to plan out the visit.

~ReR~

So late that night it was early the next day, Annek woke in the dark of his room to the curious sensation of falling. He landed shortly thereafter with a thud, having fallen from the bed, wrapped in sheets. He groaned and gingerly disentangled himself, trying to get his bearings. Hed been dreaming of the first time he had had a Patron, and now the whole experience came swimming to the forefront of his thoughts. He reassured himself that he could move, flexing fingers and toes, rolling a shoulder. He was painstakingly remaking the bed (his ritual to compose himself) trying to force the repulsive out through meticulous attention to detail, when he realized there was no sound coming from the train, no gentle sway on the tracks as it made its way home.

He peeked out the window to see they were sitting outside a station with a District Four sign. Must be filling out the papers for travel. All the trains stopped at depots if they were crossing through the Districts, coming and going. People jumping aboard to find a new life in another District or even the Capitol had been quite a problem a few years back. Most of the Avoci in the Capitol were District folk, who tried to make a run for it and failed, losing their tongues and voices and humanity in the process.

It was the darkest part of the night. His car was set further back from the engine, which had pulled up flush with the far end of the depot, and the tall, dim lights pooling in the darkness didn't reach his room. He opened his window and his heart thrilled. That familiar salt tang in the air, the thrum and rush of the ocean... The sound was distant, not much more than an overheard whisper, and the salt was overpowered by the stench of oil and grease from the train, but it was there. It was there.

As he stood, eyes straining for some glimmer in the night, the train lurched and chugged into motion again, and he crawled back into bed.  
>He slept soundly for the first time in what felt like ages.<p>

When he woke again, the sky was overcast through the window, a non-threatening, plain gray that promised nothing but spitting rain. It was the most beautiful sky he had ever seen.

He found Meghan in her room, packing her suitcase, and he found that they would be pulling in a few minutes. They argued briefly over the merits of him making an appearance as soon as the train stopped, but in a rare win, Annek's plan of him quietly slipping off and laying low until the Q and A carried the day.

He hastily packed his bags and left them piled for the Avoci to carry to his house in the Victor's Village. As soon as the train chugged to a stop, he was off, exiting through the back and making his way towards his home. There was a small crowd of onlookers, but most people in the square were busy with their lives and didn't notice him sneaking from the far door of the station. He made a mental note to thank Meghan. Without the ridiculous amount of makeup he wore for public appearances, it was so much easier for him to go about without being recognized. He was excited to be home, but answering the same questions again and again didn't appeal. Besides, it had been so long since he'd talked to anyone, it felt easier just to keep the silence.

He slowed down to a brisk walk, debating. He was pretty sure his family would be in his house, but there was always the chance they were in the tiny cottage he grew up in. Since the house was closer, he decided to check there first. He broke into a jog almost unconsciously. Everything spurred him faster. He was lost in memories and different versions of how the reunion would happen, when he heard a "Hey!" and found himself on the damp pavement and on top of a very shocked girl.

"Oh my god, I'm so sorry!" He scrambled up and held out a hand.  
>"Are you blind? It's not like I'm invisible. I was standing there for ages." The girl looked rather disgruntled and picked herself up without touching him. As she dusted her pants off, she noted a wet blotch of puddle water and grit on her side, and stared at him. "I literally just washed these today. Are you happy?"<p>

He watched her dumbly for a minute. She looked really familiar, but he couldn't place it. She was nearly as tall as he was, and had skin like deep, golden bronze and a halo of glossy black curls. He looked into her nearly-black eyes, watching a slow recognition emerge.

"...Annek?" And he knew.

"Julia!" He wrapped his arms around her, the elation from being home extending even to old, half-remembered acquaintances. She didn't return it and he released her awkwardly.

"What are you doing back in Four?" She was a bit disbelieving.

"Well, I have a Q and A in a few days, so I came back to spend some time with my family before that." He cleared his throat. "How.. how have you been?"

"Same old, really. I sell fish in the Market..." She cast about for interesting tidbits, but she couldn't think of anything.

"Really? I'll be sure to stop by and buy some!" He was overeager and sensed he had overstepped.

"Alright..." She looked at him askance. "Well I uh, I have to go-"

"Oh, right, yeah. Um hey, it was great to see you again, you should stop by sometime!"

"Yeah, it was..." She walked swiftly away and he could hear her mumbling something under her breath.

He continued on his way, at a walk this time, feeling his face flush with embarrassment. They had been in the same group of friends years ago, but they were never all that close. Around the time he was Reaped, they hadn't even been talking. It was dumb to be so overly friendly with her. He cringed inwardly, but was distracted from his embarrassment by looking around. Things had been picking up for his Ward, it seemed. Main Street was much sleeker than he remembered, with glossy storefronts and bright pavestone walkways, and the Market was sprawling. He even saw a few cars puttering around, although they were a few seasons old.

By the time he neared the Victor's Village, the drizzling rain was getting heavier, turning into fat drops that splashed into puddles, soaking the hem of his pants. The lane of stalwart, mostly empty mansions bordered an expansive private beach, and the wind from the sea whipped the rain into almost painful bullets. For Annek, the beach was their only redeeming quality. He had always felt guilty living in such an extravagant house when most people were only a fortnight away from homelessness. In his little corner of Four, Ward Seven, absolutely everything depended on the fishing.

The District in general was a comfortable one, especially compared to the hardscrabble coal miners in Twelve. Everything seemed cheerful now, but he remembered the spill from when he was eight. A ship bound for the Capitol, carrying millions of gallons of oil ripped out its hull on a reef. It had wiped out the Gulf for years afterward. Hundreds of thousands of seabirds, all of the big fish, tuna, sharks, dolphins, seals, rays, crustaceans and oysters and clams, everything in the water washed up rotting and coated in reeking black. Everyone he knew who was eligible, even June, had taken as many Tesserae as they could, but he remembered with a creeping sensation how the students at school just...withered away. No one laughed or ran at recess; they didn't have the energy to. Clothes that had been fitted or even tight were now swimming pools of fabric. Students would be there one day, skeletal, dull-eyed, with bloated bellies, and then never again, and no one spoke of them. It was like they had never existed. He didn't know how his parents fed four people; he was only glad Marcus hadn't been born yet. He only knew that he always had something, even if it was only a small loaf of seabread, salty and pale green, made from sea kelp grown in the inland waterfields. That year was the first Game he could remember, and both Tributes had volunteered. They had started a five-year streak of them. Pity that none of them won. There were rumors that other Wards began to train like Districts One and Two, though. And he'd seen Four's Tributes the past two years. They were definitely more prepared than he had been, though they hadn't made it past the halfway mark either time.

He meandered up the walkway, avoiding the worms that were escaping the waterlogged, sandy grass. He fumbled for his keys. He tried nearly all of them on the ring and was beginning to think he had left the right keys on the train, when the lock clicked and the heavy oak door swung open slowly.

It smelled big and empty, with the sharp, clean tang of cotton. There weren't any lights on in the foyer, but back towards the kitchen, in the glass walled sunroom, he saw the light of a reading lamp and the bobbing ankle of a figure in the chair, which stopped, listening intently.

"June?" His voice was much shakier than he thought it would be.

"Annek?" The ankle uncrossed, followed by a swish of fabric which disappeared further into the room, out of his line of sight.

"Is it really you?" It was a question almost afraid to hear the answer.

"Yes, it's me." He walked slowly towards her, craning his neck to see around the corner.

She was standing there, clutching a bat, the most awful mix of fear and hope written on her face.

"What's that for?" He was not a little alarmed, and held up his hands instinctively.

The next instant, the bat was cast aside, clattering onto the floor, and she crushed him in a hug, surprising strength in her thin frame.

"I've missed you so much!" Annek tried to hold it in, but he broke first, huge sobs of emotion overwhelming the both of them. Marcus peeked around the corner, then ran to greet his older brother.

"It's really you," he whispered, squirming his way in to wrap his bony arms around Annek's middle.

~ReR~

The next few days were a dream, of sorts, but not a happy one. The lack of communication on both ends, save one ill-fated letter, had taken its toll. Picking up where they had left off, before Annek left for the Capitol, before he returned a Victor, before even the Fifty-Ninth Hunger Games, proved an impossible task. Annek couldn't or wouldn't say much about anything, and his older sister was similarly reticent, more out of retaliation than actual need. When it finally came out he was only in town for a few days and not home for good like she originally assumed, she turned cold, masking immeasurable pain with a stony wall of silence.

There didn't seem to be room for him here, anymore. There was plenty of space, and all three of them knocked about the enormous house like marbles in an empty pool, but June and Marcus had made a life for themselves that didn't include Annek. Marcus was withdrawn; a quiet, shy boy, pining over some dulcinea. He spent most of his time in his room or running around with his friends, not unlike Annek when he was Marcus' age.

June was similarly absent. She didn't work, but she busied herself volunteering: babysitting a family where both mother and father worked; bringing food or company to a shut-in spinster; caring for the lost souls in hospice. There was always a meal on the table at night, but they all ate alone. It took a few tries for her to make enough for both Marcus and Annek, leaving the older boy to fend for himself, fighting back bitterness. Annek tried to engage either in conversation whenever their paths crossed- asking Marcus what he was learning in school over morning cereal; asking June what her plans for the day were when they met on the staircase- but he was met with one or two word-answers, and the message couldn't have been clearer.

Even his friends were too busy for him. They were all happy he was back, and there was no shortage of "It's great to see you, man"s and "I'm so excited you're finally back!"s, but no one wanted to actually spend time with him. After the fifth "I'd love to, but..." that offered a time conveniently after the day he'd just said he was heading back to the Capitol, he gave up trying.

What he had wanted most since he had been taken to the City was right in front of him, but it wanted no part of him. He didn't even have the dream of it anymore.  
>In the darkest recesses of his heart, Annek found himself wishing he was back in the Capitol.<p> 


	6. Full Tense

Annek woke in the very early morning hours from a dreamless sleep. He was bleary-eyed, but he couldn't wait any longer; the burning desire within him drove him out of bed and down the spiraling stairs, soundlessly passing his family's rooms. He grabbed a set of keys from the counter and a pear or two, a hunk of cheddar and bread, a flask of water, and stuffed them in a waterproof knapsack. He slipped barefoot through the back door, locking it behind him, and trudged through the damp, heavy sand to the boathouse nearer the shoreline. In the near pitch black, he deftly avoided the long, _shhhhh-_ing tufts of beach grass and scattered rocks. The chill from the sea gave him goosebumps across his bare torso and had him contemplating a trek back for a windbreaker or at least a shirt, but he pressed forward.

The boathouse was a crisp white, reflective in the night. He fumbled with the lock for a bit, until the hasp released and he opened the door onto further blackness. He felt along the wall for the pull-string to the antiquated bulbs, and memory guided him. In here, the salt smell of the ocean was concentrated, with a musky, sandy, slightly moldy smell from weathered wood and damp stone that comforted, rather than repelled. A dim bulb flickered overhead, and a thin yellow light washed over the room. He looked around. A large, two-person kayak balanced on two bars on the far wall, an even larger canoe hanging from the ceiling, a multitude of nets on hooks, a few fishing rods propped up against a wall, and a small sea kayak laying on the floor in a shallow, wide puddle, still wet from its last excursion. A gritty layer of salt and sand was forming where the water was slowly evaporating. He felt his ire spark. Evangeline was his baby, and someone (Marcus, probably, who shouldn't even be going out alone yet, and certainly not in his boat) had just dragged her in and tossed her aside to let the salt etch into her fiberglass and screw up her ties and let her hull warp like so much trash. He hefted the dripping, glossy black boat and set her down close to the surf, where her gave her a once-over like a fretting father comforting a new baby. He ran back to the boathouse and grabbed a net, a fishing rod, and a paddle and returned to Evangeline. He stowed everything carefully and pushed off into the onyx waters.

He was gliding nearly silently across the sea, glass in the waning moonlight. It was laying down nicely, and miniature waves lapped against the slender, 14-foot kayak almost reverently. Evangeline floated effortlessly, unfazed by her abuse. She was a work of art, and Annek had scrimped and saved for two years for her. He had gotten her just one month before his Reaping. Combined with his expert handling, he was flying across the water, out towards the hazy, barely-there line of the horizon. His heart soared; emotions welled that were almost too much for his body to hold. Watching the sunrise on the water was his most treasured ritual, that he had missed dearly. He paddled for what seemed like hours, intent on his destination. He let memory take over, guiding him, until he was surrounded by waves, and land was silhouetted in the mist behind him. While he was paddling, the night was burning away; already the sea beneath him was a sullen deep teal instead of black, and sky was changing. The moon had set over an hour ago, and the stars were winking out handful by handful. On the horizon, a fire was burning, and the sky was an ombre of deep black back towards shore, a rich navy overhead, a glowing coral-red resting on the horizon, and the sea was awash in flame. The only sound was gentle waves, and the hollow lapping and sloshing at his hull. He secured his paddle and just drifted, hands resting in the cold ocean. He drank in the sunrise as the sea lightened to a crystalline blue; the sun chasing away the night. He contemplated dropping in a line and seeing what he brought up, but he decided against it. He figured fishing was still strictly controlled, and he was weary of risk and intrigue. He rummaged through his knapsack and chewed thoughtfully on a pear, before dropping the core and watching it disappear into the now aquamarine depths.

In this moment, he was whole again. It was so easy out here to think the past few years had never happened. He was just a boy of 18 again. Death wasn't hounding him; the Capitol's true, monstrous face was hidden behind one of relatively tame savagery; his parents were still in their cottage, waiting for him to come home with a few contraband fish; Parker was still there with June; there was no such thing as Annek, Victor. He allowed himself to drift into daydreams. In these he celebrated his 19th birthday unscathed, finally free from the Games and the threat of Reaping. He went on about his life; got a job in one of the fishing crews. Maybe even one of the elite that went to the frigid waters far to the north and west to catch salmon or crab. He'd come back with stories to turn his mother pale and his friends green with envy. Win the heart of some girl. Get married, maybe, never have kids. Grow old in some secluded village shrouded in palm trees and lush foliage, a tiny corner of happiness.

_Solace in solitude._ Even as he dreamed of a life unbroken, everything seemed to fall away, until there was only the early, watery sun, the waves, and him. He lay back in Evangeline and watched the changing sky. He almost didn't notice as he closed his eyes. As his consciousness floated away and he nodded off, he noted in some dim place of his mind the wind was blowing out to sea.

When Annek woke again, the sun was high overhead, he was burned all over and drenched in sweat. It was a cloudless, hot day and the early morning wind had died away. He sat up with a start, disoriented, and nearly flipped the kayak. Her glossy black coat, sleek and perfect for nighttime forays, had soaked up the radiant heat, and he felt like he was on the cusp of cooking himself. He looked around. Through the glare off the sea, he could just make out a speck that he hoped was land, and he hoped was real. He was at least five miles out. He drained the now-hot fresh water from the flask, hoping to recover some fluids that had baked out of him. He felt like he was pickled. The sea spray had coated him in a fine layer of salt from head to waist, where the spray skirt attached. He detached it, gagging at the odor of hot cheddar and sweat, and deftly maneuvered his legs out of the cockpit so he was straddling Evangeline, legs dangling in the water to cool off. The difference between the upper and lower halves of his torso was alarming to say the least. What wasn't glowing angry red was a deep tan, and the rest was rather pale. Meghan was going to hate him.

He couldn't hold that position for too long: Evangeline was searing hot, his swim trunks did nothing to stop the burning heat, and it was too unstable. He splashed himself with water and settled back I, but not before dumping the melty cheese and bread overboard.

He cursed himself heartily for falling asleep again, and started the long trek back into shore.

He really was an idiot for letting himself get carried away, and there was a deep, curious ache beyond the smarting of the sunburn in his chest. Navel-gazing was utterly useless. He couldn't change the past by pining for it and a wicked sunburn is all he got for his trouble. Dreaming and wishing wouldn't bring Parker and his parents back, couldn't stop the pain he'd brought to his whole family. Wouldn't stop the shame. The ache in his chest intensified, choking him. He swallowed hard and slowly, painfully, he shoved it down and locked it away. He would deal with it sometime later. Now, he turned his attention to getting back home before he died of heat stroke.

A good three hours of hard paddling later, and he finally pulled back into the inlet his beach was set in. Well and truly roasted, he gingerly extricated himself from Evangeline when he was in about 6 feet, and slipped into the cool water. He walked up the gentle grade onto the shore, dragging Evangeline beside him. He pulled her up on the beach and flopped down, exhausted. He hissed as his tender, parched skin scraped against the pebbly sand. He lay there, gathering his strength for quite some time in the early afternoon, until he opened his eyes to find Marcus staring back down at him, poking stick at the ready.

"June wants to know where you've been." His little brother's voice was just beginning to break, and Marcus took no small amount of pride in the fact that for once, his older sister wasn't mad at him.

"Warm welcome." Annek was in no mood for the lecture that was waiting.

"You promised we were going to go out fishing this afternoon." Marcus was petulant, annoyed that Annek had gone out without him.

"Yeah, well that was before I knew you were sneaking out in Evangeline. You're too young to be out there alone, Marcus." He roused himself, bending as little as possible until he was standing.

"How did you know?" Marcus was awed, and a little bit cagey.

"You left her in a puddle of water to warp and get scratched. You know better than that."

Marcus' face fell, and Annek softened.

"Listen, I'll get you boat of your own, and you can do whatever you want with it, alright? Go tell June I went out to watch the sunrise and fell asleep, and I'll be in in a minute."

Marcus ran back towards the house, appeased.

Annek watched him for a moment, then turned his attention to Evangeline, who was bobbing gently in the waves. He took her over to the boathouse and balanced her on the two workhorses beside it. He unloaded everything he had taken with him on his ill-fated journey, and rinsed the kayak inside and out with the hose. He left her to air-dry and made his way up to the house. Ever since Parker, June had been a brittle, angry thing, and Annek couldn't blame her. She had done her best to keep the family together in the year that had passed, and was raising Marcus as her own. He helped out as much as he could, but that was only money, and he was learning pretty quickly that June didn't count that as much of anything.

He stepped into the giant kitchen-dining room from the back porch, which was deserted for now. The cool air was heaven on his poor skin. He filled and emptied a glass of water three times, thirst finally slaked. When he turned around, she was standing there, eyes blazing with keen anger. He swallowed hard.

"Hey June, do we have some of that sunburn salve anywhere?" He tried to steer the conversation away from the lecture he knew was coming, but she was determined.

"Annek, where have you been? I wake up early to fix us all breakfast as a family for the first time in years and you're just gone! No note, no notice, just gone! And then it turns out you fall asleep on the water? Annek, you could have died! If something had come along or that little boat of yours had flipped..." She was incensed, and broke off abruptly.

" I didn't mean to for chrissake. I'm fully aware of how stupid it was. Besides, the last seven days, I've barely even seen you. Why was today any different?" His voice rose as he deflected her accusations. He gestured to his now-scarlet skin. "Salve? Please?" She was more prickly than he remembered, and he hoped that was extent of it.

June snorted and went rummaging through the cabinetry. She found a small pot of it and all but hurled it at him. He didn't bother to wait, but started slathering it on his face, reveling in the ice-cold, soothing gel. Meanwhile, June continued her tirade. It had been building for some time now, quietly. She wanted, no, needed that catharsis, and now that he was finally here in front of her and she had a legitimate excuse to confront him, she was going for it.

"You can't do that, you know. You can't just show up here one night after not saying a single word to me for a year and a goddamned half, not even after Parker and Mom and Dad died, and expect me to just to be fine with it. And then just leaving in the middle of the night like you were never here? Do you know, given the circumstances, what that does to me? To Marcus? How was I supposed to know you didn't end up like them?"

Annek looked properly ashamed, but she dug deeper.

"At first, I thought you had snuck off with some girl here. I suppose it's some small solace that you were by yourself."

Annek stopped in mid-swipe.

"And why would my company be of any concern to you?" His voice was hard. He could bear a lecture he deserved, or even one about things he had no control over, but this was out of left field, and a subject that kept him awake nights. His failed excursion had put him in a sour mood, and he was quickly reaching a line in his mind. On one side, he could stay silent, let June get everything out, and continue on as things were. On the other, he could let himself go; say exactly what he was feeling and thinking with the cruelest words he could find, no matter the emotional cost. He was on the edge, toes curled around the precipice, the slightest gust enough to send him tumbling.

"Why wouldn't it be? You affect all of us, you know. Ever since you flounced off to the Capitol, you've been all over the tabloids as some... some slimy carousing party boy. Our parents didn't raise you like that. It's disgusting, and I won't have you doing that while you're here. I can barely see my friends without you having done something new to spark them all gossiping. There are days I feel like I can barely keep my head up. Well, I won't have it! Even if you've let being a Victor go to your head, this family still has some dignity. Part of me doesn't even want to be seen with you. The things they say that you've done..You know there are some days I wonder if it wouldn't have been better for all of us if you hadn't won." She spat out the last few words, and in that instant knew she had crossed a line that was impossible to ever come back from.

Annek was momentarily stunned. It was like falling through the ice in the middle of winter. His own sister wished him dead...

He was incandescent with hurt and rage, and he had advanced, backing her into a corner, until he had drawn himself up to his full six feet, fists balled, muscles tensed, towering over her shrinking, cowering form, her arms thrown protectively up. He paused, torn in this terrible moment that seemed to stretch on for ages. With great effort, he pulled himself back from the edge. He dropped his arms, and stepped back. He turned on his heel, snatched the salve from the marble countertop and stormed upstairs with one look that would freeze the sun. The echoing slam was painfully loud; a dead, tense silence followed.

June unfurled herself slowly, shell-shocked. Annek had never raised so much as finger to her. It was the first time she had ever been truly, utterly scared of him. She struggled to reconcile the loving boy she knew and the... murderer she had seen in the Arena. He was capable of truly horrible things, and now it began to dawn on her just how far she had pushed him. A fresh wave of terror came over her, and she sank to the floor. It was deafeningly quiet, and she just stared.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: It's probably not wise to burn through my cushion given how slowly I'm writing, but here's 5 and 6 :3 **

**A big thank you to my beta readers, especially the inestimable MotherCrumpet.**

**As always, let me know what you think, good or bad!**


	7. Making Up Is Hard To Do

Annek felt like simultaneously punching somebody and crawling into a hole and dying. He stalked his room like a caged beast, nerves pinging with energy. His thoughts were scattered, and he jumped between raging at June, himself and the Capitol. She should know he wasn't like that, right? He supposed she only knew from the tabloids, and the Capitol buried its dirty secrets. She could (and would) never know the truth. She could never even know why one pitch-black night she left her parents and Parker sitting around the table drinking after-dinner coffee to pick up the secret engagement cake that would surprise her parents with the news, and came back to an empty kitchen swimming in blood. She would never know why she had to pick Marcus up from his friend's house, take him to Annek's, and tell him his parents were dead. Or why the official report was their boat was found, and a smuggling venture gone awry was suspected.

He would never forget that night when the letter came, tear-stained and faded in spots. It was almost clinical, her spidery handwriting steady as it wrote the long list of blood-curdling events. He had read it three times without it sinking in, and when it did, it was a hard kick to stomach. Even worse than the knowledge he and his siblings were now orphans and his sister had lost her fiance, was the dawning, dreadful realization he alone was responsible; their deaths punishment meted out for his obstinacy.

But how could she wish him dead? It was a bone-deep, searing ache that would stay with him, he realized, forever. Even if she apologized, and he hoped more than anything that she would, the fact remained: in that moment, June would have rather had anyone else but him standing there. If that was what she wanted, he'd leave her to it.

He drifted back and forth between rage and overwhelming sadness. One moment he was at the door, intent on letting her know just how wrong she was about him, the next debating whether or not to stay in the house, or even kicking her out, since she obviously wasn't interested in anything to do with him. Again, he turned. Why would he do that? He's the reason she's in this position to begin with...

This was going nowhere. He sat down on the plush bed, forcing his trembling hands to still. He folded his legs, and was about to begin meditating when the stinging of the sunburn and protesting skin brought him abruptly out of his thoughts. He retrieved the pot from the floor, where it had landed when he flung it against the wall. Cracked, but serviceable. He unscrewed the top and his eyes watered as the sharp menthol met his nose again. The translucent blue-green gel was invaluable for fishermen in the intense District 4 summers. It not only soothed the burn, but healed it completely within a few hours of application. It would still leave the blotchy tan, however. He applied it to the parts of his face that he had missed, and went to work on his arms, then his torso. It numbed throbbing pain that he hadn't registered, and it sapped his anger away along with it.

By the time he had finished, he had his head again, crippling pain locked away for some other day. He dressed, and went downstairs. If anything, he should apologize for scaring her. A wave of shame came over him as he realized how close he had been to hurting her. June didn't need him spilling his guts out to her. She needed someone in her corner, and until she told him to die in a fire, he'd be there for her, no matter what. He owed her, and it was the very least he could do.

He silently descended the spiral stairs, wanting to get a feel for her mood before he approached. He couldn't take anymore if she was still feeling punchy.

She was sitting at the table, staring out to the sea through the glass wall of the house. Her cropped auburn hair was tucked behind her ears, outlining the feminine counterpart to Annek's strong jaw. She was thinner, he noticed, and she held herself like a scolded puppy; shoulders hugged in and slumped, belying her statuesque frame. She was taller than him when she wanted to be, but right now she looked so frail, so small. Long, graceful fingers held a steaming mug of chamomile tea (her favorite), and a misty, distant look was in her eyes.

He looked round, grabbed the jar of sugar cubes and walked a bit louder to the table so she would notice him. He pushed the sugar cubes over to her, a timid peace offering. Her eyes focused, and thanked him with a watery smile.

"Annek, I'm so sorry. I never meant to say that." she began, and the waver in her voice betrayed the fact she had been crying or would soon. " I worry about you every day. You went off to the Capitol almost overnight with no goodbye, you won't say a word about why, or when or if you're coming back, or what you're doing, I hear more about you from the news and my friends. The only thing I get from you is a ratty envelope of money every so often. All these things that you've done, how you're partying every other night and have a new girl every week, the drugs... I know that it's not my little brother, I know it's not you and I'm scared." Her voice cracked, and Annek opened his mouth, but she held up a long hand and he hushed.

"And then, after eighteen months, you just show up on the doorstep, and expect not to have to say anything at all? At least just tell me you're not allowed to or something, Annek, I'll understand, I will. I don't know what's going on, but I want to help you any way I can. We used to be so close, and I want so much for us to be close again. We're all Marcus has now, and-" She broke, here, racked by bitter sobs, and Annek wrapped her in a hug.

The urge to spill everything, to lay it all out on the table for her was almost unbearable. And yet, he didn't. All he could manage to whisper was "I'm sorry".

She collected herself, after a while, the menthol rising off of his skin cutting through the fog, focusing her mind, allowing her to stop sobbing. She waved him off and wiped her face with a napkin. Annek went to go find Marcus, who was in his room, as usual. He brought him back downstairs, sat him down at the table, and gathered his thoughts. He couldn't look either of them in the eye. When he spoke, it was after a long silence.

"I know... I haven't exactly been here for you. I'm sorry. I wish I could tell you why things are the way they are, but I can't, and that's for the best. I promise I will always take care of you both in any way that I can, and I promise I'll come back as much as possible. But I.. What I can tell you is this. The Capitol isn't done with its Victors after the Games, and I'm there because President Snow wants me to be. It's an unspoken contract for winning. I love you both dearly, and I wish I could be here with you, but I can't help it. I think about you guys every day, and the less you know, the better. I can't answer anything, so please, let's leave it here. Just... just know that I'm living for you two. Nothing and no one else. "

He met their eyes here, first Marcus, then June, as if through a look he could tell them everything.

"If you didn't want me..." He heaved a sigh.

He searched their eyes for anything. Acceptance? Hurt?

Marcus was almost uncomprehending. He had heard the shouting, but knew better than to eavesdrop. He had once on his parents, and they had grounded him for a month. When he had come in a few hours earlier to tell June where Annek was, the look on her face told him he should disappear, and he did. Closed the door to his room and put on headphones (brand new, for his birthday last month) and drew. Annek had been gone since he was nine, and his brother was transforming before his eyes. Every year, the older boy in fuzzy memories of water, sand and family life faded away, bit by bit; the proud and distant idol gracing tabloids and interviews sharpened ever so slightly. He found himself scared more than anything of his older brother. Like he was a stranger who had stepped into his skin. Someone moody, and quick to anger, unreachable behind a glass wall. He nodded quietly. He had had enough of yelling.

June was torn. She knew that something was very wrong, but she didn't know enough to even begin asking questions. He was shutting her out, too. Refusing to give even the barest hint of what was going on. She supposed she deserved it after telling him what she did. She wished, more than anything, there was someone she could talk to, someone she could lean on, hash everything out with, but they were all dead and gone. She was utterly, totally alone. The pain of it threatened, for one second, to consume her whole. It took monumental effort to let the matter die, and she consoled herself by promising she would have the truth, and soon. "Okay." A simple word, spoken softly, said volumes.

Annek's shoulders sagged with relief. "I'm gonna go out and clear my head. I need to talk to Meghan about tomorrow. I'll be back later tonight."

She had just agreed to not bring it up again, but just like that? Everything was done and buried, as if it was just a forgotten chore, or unintended slight? Something curdled in her heart, then. She waved him off, but the work they had done repairing the ever-widening chasm between them was gone, fallen into the abyss between.

He grabbed his bag from the mud room, checked his face in the bathroom mirror, drank another glass of water, and he was off. The heat had only grown more oppressing in the late afternoon, sultry and humid.

He wandered without much purpose for a while, and found himself at the marketplace. He wandered up and down the stalls, saying hi to old friends, nodding politely to others. He found Palek's stall, near the far end of the market. He had moved since Annek had last been. It was bare, with the man behind it sketching on a well-used pad of paper. Palek was old, too old to remember exactly just how old he was. A crotchety, wizened man made bitter by years of injustices and want, he was the most skilled craftsman when it came to boats in the Ward (7 of 14 in District 4) . He had made Evangeline, and Annek quickly set up a deal for Marcus' present. Palek was none too happy to have a rush job, and an unusual one at that, but he promised (with the help of a few hundred-coin notes) to have it done in two days. Annek paid in full and wandered on.

The thought struck him, as he wandered past stalls of bright, cheap fabrics, handmade goods, fishing nets and hooks, lures flashing in the sun, and stone, hemp and shell jewelry, that this was just a rough approximation of the Capitol.

It was a late, hot day, and no stall-keeper worth his salt had fresh fish out. It was all tucked away in coolers full of ice, and it was too much hassle for the stall-keepers to get it out, especially without a guaranteed buy. He wasn't in the mood for any of the (barely) live seafood languishing in grimy, bubbling tanks, and was about to give up hope and go back out to catch his own when he spotted Julia.

He wanted to fix her opinion of him. At least this time he had the drop on her. He sauntered over while she was occupied with a cooler.

"Do you have any red snapper I could take off your hands?" He said it as suavely as he could manage.

"Luck, no, I swear if you and your friend try that one more time I'll-"

She popped up to find a very surprised Annek staring bemusedly at her.

"Oh. Hi." She fidgeted. "Can I help you?"

"Hi," he replied, suppressing a grin. "Rough day?"

"You don't know the half of it. Are you actually going to buy fish or just distract me so a friend can make off with the coolers?"

"Well, if you have good reds, I'll be more than happy to steal them from you."

Julia ran her tongue across her teeth and looked him up and down.

"I see you've gotten a tan since I last saw you." She bent down to rustle around in something.

"Making up for lost time." He shifted a bit.

"How bout this one?"

She laughed and heaved a fish up to the display. It was a horror show. The normally clear eyes were a cloudy, dull white, like old milk. Black blood clots in sticky brown gills that should have been a crisp red. It was beginning to bloat, decay hastened by the sun, and it smelled incredibly fishy.

Annek's disgust was written plainly on his face. "What _is_ that?"

"It was a sea bass. But it hasn't sold and got left out by accident. Just testing to see if the Capitolist boy still has his fishy wits about him."

"Do I pass?" Annek allowed a grin to broaden.

"With flying colors. Here, best I have."

She rinsed her hands in a nearby bucket, and opened the cooler to reveal ten glossy snappers, crimson in the now-setting sun.

"Is this all you have left?"

"Yeah. Are they not good enough for your tastes?" Her question was a bit sharp on the end from perceived slight.

"No, these are gorgeous. I'll buy you out."

"You realize even with the end-of-day discount these are about 15 coins apiece, right?" Julia was skeptical. Snapper wasn't a luxury, but it wasn't cheap, either.

"Snapper is my favorite. Would it make you feel better if you came over to help us out with them?" He said casually.

"That's what you were after this whole time, weren't you?"

"Absolutely. See you at eight?"

Julia watched him for a moment, studying him.

"Sure." She smiled wryly.

Money and fish changed hands, and Annek made his way back, eager to prepare for dinner. At last, something was going his way.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Hello! I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoy writing it :) If you do, please leave a review!**


	8. Stories

As he was walking back, Annek realized that the timing was all wrong. He flip-flopped between going back and rescheduling for another night, or just pushing through and damning the consequences. Complicating things was the fact he hadn't intended at all to make a move on her. It was force of habit more than anything. He wasn't exactly complaining, though. She was pretty enough and he was a bit desperate for some positive attention. He noted with some chagrin that he had gotten more comfortable than he wanted to be in the spotlight, and his less-than-heroic welcome home was edifying in more ways than one. Running through different excuses to explain, he always came back to the truth, or a version made mostly of truth. Anything else would sound harsh and fake in light of the fight, and the last thing he wanted was to hurt June more now. The fish were weighty in their waterproof bag, swinging and shifting heavily against his back in time with his gait as he walked home.

June was still at the table when he returned, looking as if she hadn't moved in the hours he'd been gone.

He took a light tone, hoping if he didn't make a big deal, she wouldn't either.

"Hey, I got some snappers, and I ran into an old friend. I hope you don't mind she's coming over for dinner."

He looked over at her as he stashed the fish in the fridge for a moment, hopeful. June's angular face was carefully blank, staring out the window, and she was rigid in her seat. "That's fine," she said tonelessly. "Do you have everything?"

"Yup. Go relax, take a bath, I'll let you know when everything's ready." She looked at him sharply and opened her mouth to say something, but bit her words. She went upstairs, leaving her mug and spoon on the table. He picked them up and put them in the sink, blithely unaware of her mood.

As he was organizing the kitchen, hunting down pans and bowls and flour and spices and cutting boards, he found his thoughts drifting back to Julia. They were close when they were younger, running in the same crew growing up. They had drifted apart a few years back. Sometime before his Games though, they had stopped talking altogether. The more he thought about it, the less he was sure this was a good idea.

He set out the bowls in order: flour first, then eggs, a wide, shallow pan full of breadcrumbs and seasonings and then a deep pan of oil heating on the stove. He was just about to start cleaning the fish when the doorbell rang, and he nearly jumped out of his skin. He dashed to open it, and then stopped short.

Julia was standing there in the porchlight, looking a bit discomfited, like she'd bolt at any minute. She'd come from a full day of work- sweaty, hair in a messy ponytail and makeup faded; in spite of it, she had a rustic sort of elegance about her that threw him. Annek quickly regained his composure, opening the door and ushering her in with a smile.

"Hi..." She edged past him, and took in the wide-open space of the marbled foyer and sprawling layout, the wide staircase lazily curving to the upper floor. "Wow."

"Not bad, eh?"

"Never thought I'd see the inside of one of these. Are they all like this?" She was a bit awed, and spoke in hushed tones.

I guess. I've never really been in the others, just Mags' in Ward Three." He ran a hand across his hair, and led her towards the back of the house, feeling a little bit like he was giving a show-and-tell presentation. There was a Victor's Village in every Ward of every District. Ridiculously expensive and opulent mansions, at least ten in each Village. The Capitol went to such expense and trouble for places that would go to waste and lie vacant for one reason: an ever-present reminder of the Games, the Capitol's inexhaustible coffers, and the utter servitude the Districts were in. They were magnificent, gilded cages, a beauty spot over a syphilitic pock mark.

They got to the kitchen. Annek began arranging the fish when Julia picked up a wickedly curved knife and grinned. "Race ya."

He lifted a brow and hunted down another knife and board. "You sure? Can you lose gracefully?"

"No, but it's okay, because I'll win." She was supremely confident.

"Uh huh." He was less so.

"Is Annek Alda scared he's gone soft?" She teased.

"I just don't want to put up with you whining all night that I cheated."

"Are you planning to?"

"Absolutely. What will I win?" Annek edged his hand over to the pile of fish, and Julia jabbed it away with her knife.

"_If_ you win, I stay for dinner."

" And, for kicks, if you win?"

Julia thought for a moment. "I get to ask you anything, and you have to answer honestly."

"No."

"I'll narrow it down. You tell me the story of what happened in your Games?"

His gaze snapped from the pile of fish to her face, surprised. "You didn't watch them?"

"No, I didn't. Yes or no?"

"It's not really my favorite subject."  
>"Well, then you'll just have to try to win, won't you?" And she was done with a fillet before she finished the sentence.<p>

Annek cursed under his breath and hustled to catch up, hacking a fillet in half in the process. "Oops." In retrospect, it wasn't wise to challenge her when he was rusty and it was part of her job.

"Doesn't neatness count for anything?"

"No, no it doesn't. Except for yours. Yours have to be perfect or they don't count." Annek was getting a bit flustered, so he focused on his task. Knife just behind the fin, perpendicular to the poor beast, a clean slice down to the spine. Turn the fish so it faces away from him. Guide knife along the spine towards him, avoiding the belly, then along the tail. Check for stray bones, flip, repeat.

Soon the fish was frying- bubbling and hissing away in the oil. Julia had won in a walk, cleaning seven fish to his three and a half, even with Annek counting his butchered fillet as two.

Preparing the other dishes for dinner, he watched her as she leaned against the island counter.

"You really never watched my Games? Aren't they mandatory?" He asked skeptically.

"No. my parents never let us, since we were friends and Doe was friends with my sister. We stayed in our room for the duration. They kept us out of school, away from the theaters and the screens they'd put up around town. They told us every night whether you and Doe were still alive, but they wouldn't tell us what was happening, and they still won't let me watch reruns."

"Oh." He didn't have much to say, and they finished preparing dinner in silence.

Dinner passed quickly after getting off to a rocky start. When June saw that Julia was indeed an old friend, she warmed up immensely and the two quickly reformed a sisterly bond, trading recent stories and gossip from the Ward. For Annek, it was as if they had picked up when they were still close. Marcus was indifferent. He ate quickly and went out, after asking June if he could visit a friend. Annek watched him leave. He hadn't been able to connect with Marcus at all since he'd been back. It was like he was slipping away, right through his fingers. He hoped the kayak would be enough to at least start them talking again.

Annek and Julia ended up outside in the balmy night air, with June washing dishes and watching protectively from the kitchen. Their meandering path had led them to the very edge of the shore, comfortably ensconced in the still-warm sand with the sea breeze whispering around them, cool waves lapping at toes. They watched the moon glinting off black waves, casting a wide pool of silver-white. It was so peaceful when all there was sky, stars, and water, the horizon a nebulous blur between.

"So, I kept up my end, your turn." Julia was playful, but Annek was brooding, deciding how much he should tell her. It was like a tightrope between offending her and being stupid and telling her too much. He settled on the common knowledge of the Games. She didn't have to know about anything after that.

"Are you sure? I mean, sometimes it's better not knowing details. Why can't we just say it happened and leave it at that? You don't seem too much worse for wear for just knowing the outcome. It's kind of great having someone who just knows me as me, you know?" While there was truth to what he was saying, Annek was stalling, and Julia knew it.

"You know what's worse than knowing that your friends are fighting for their lives, will probably lose and you being absolutely helpless? It's the feeling of my mind running wild every second of every day, scared to go to bed and scared to wake up, thinking 'what if'. What if something had happened to you guys, or if you had to fight each other or you starved to death or died in agony. I had to nod and smile, pretending I knew exactly what people were talking about. It was horrible every day, just sitting there, waiting for my parents to say something, and being torn between wanting to know everything and nothing at all, to just pretend that it wasn't happening, because I knew every day that went by, it was more and more likely that they were gonna sit me down and tell me you and Doe were dead. And then they said that Doe was, and I knew and they knew I couldn't take it if they said you were gone. When they said you won, I didn't even believe them at first. I thought you were dead and they were just stalling or something. They let me watch your interview and then you ran off to the Capitol and you just... changed. I tried to get the story, but once people figured out I hadn't watched it, they wouldn't say a word. So no, it's not better just to say 'it happened'. I'm sick of hearing "It's better for you this way." I won that silly little race, and you promised. We were friends and I'd like to think I deserve to know."

Annek was taken aback. Julia was staring resolutely out into the sea.

He lay back on the sand, just warm enough to be soothing, rubbing his face. He mumbled something about writing checks he couldn't cash and sighed heavily.

"Fine, I'll be back." He hoisted himself up, dusted himself off and trudged back to the house. Julia watched him wordlessly through the glass wall, saw him walk past June who was still at the sink, who didn't look up to meet him. He rummaged in a cabinet, pulled out a bottle of some amber liquid, drained a fingers' worth. June's lips moved, and he looked up sharply. He said something back, and it set her off. She wheeled on him; dramatic gestures, pointing, sweeping arms. A jab with a sloshing glass from Annek. She whipped the dishcloth onto the floor at his feet and stomped out of the room. Annek watched her, shoulders bowed, then stooped to pick up the towel and set it on the counter. He caught Julia's eyes as he looked out and she quickly dropped her gaze to the sand, feeling a bit like a peeping tom, watching things she wasn't meant to see. She heard the door open and close, the sliding, soft thuds of his footsteps approaching. Annek flopped down beside her.

"It's a long story, get comfortable." He poured them both drinks, and made a divot for the bottle to rest in between them.

"What was that?" She wasn't sure if she should be concerned.

"June thinks I drink too much, and shouldn't around you. She's had just about enough of me today, apparently. I'm a black stain upon the house of Alda." There was a blithe fatality, his careful, cautious edge erased by whiskey. He finished another two fingers and went for another round. June sipped hers gingerly, not being much of a drinker. Sharp and prickling on her tongue with a wash of what felt like gasoline spreading over the back of her throat like oil. She pulled a face.

Annek chuckled to himself.

"At least there's one thing I can beat you at."

"Your story." Julia shoved him playfully, but she wasn't going to let him get sidetracked.

"Right. So after they called Doe, we got herded over to the depot by peacekeepers. We had a few minutes to say goodbye to everyone and grab a token. It was like moving in a dream. You know that this is the time you're supposed to say all the deep, dark things that are too personal for everyday conversations, but your brain is still trying to wrap itself around the fact you're never going to see anyone again. You go to say that you love someone and your mind is just blank, and of course, you're trying not to go to pieces in front of people, because you don't want that to be the last thing anyone sees of you. I remember Marcus was about nine, maybe eight. He was crying and crying and kept saying 'don't go, don't go', because no one he knew had ever come back. My parents both hugged me, but I don't think they could handle the thought of burying their kid, so they left in a bit of a hurry. It was the last time I ever saw them, actually: walking out the door, my mom holding Marcus on her hip even though he was almost as tall as her then. Dad had his arm around the both of them.

"June actually gave me my token. She had this cowrie shell necklace Parker had given her for her birthday that she wore everywhere, and we didn't have anything else, so she makes this big production of taking it off and putting it in my hand and was all, "Bring it back, ok?" I just lost it. Just bawled my eyes out and then time was up and we're on a train and we're leaving everything behind. Two days later, and we're in the Capitol, meeting all the other Tributes. It's a weird thing, you know, to meet someone and know one or both of you is gonna be dead, and you'll probably kill each other.

"Doe, though, she didn't care. She was only thirteen, but she was so... chirpy. Sweet as pie to anyone who even looked her way. They have this massive gym there that's all about getting the Tributes ready, we all trained for ages before the Games. I thought we had it bad here, with the rations and stuff, but the further you get from the Capitol, the worse you start looking. There was this one from ten or twelve, I can't remember, but she said she was 18, and she looked 11, she was so thin and small. Of course District One and Two had these big bruisers for Tributes. Their girls were like giants. Gorgeous, deadly giants.

"Anyway, you know Mags, right? She won one of the teen Games, I think. Pretty much everyone's grandma. She was nice enough to me, but she spent most of her time holed up with Doe. I didn't understand it at all, but she said it was because Doe never really stood a chance and she was trying to help her strategize. She was right, Doe only got a two in the Trials."

He drained his glass, filled another three fingers' worth, and emptied half. By now the booze was seeping in, deadening the throbbing ache in his chest, giving him a warm flush, and letting the story flow without too much pain. Rehashing the experience was proving easier than he anticipated, although he cautioned himself it was only a few minutes in and he had hours to go.

* * *

><p><strong>AN **

**Someone's not drinking for taste. **

**A big thank you to my beta readers, especially Mother Crumpet, who is the wind beneath my wings.**

**As always, if you read, please leave a review. **

**Until next time~**


	9. The Coming Storm

When we all arrived, milling about in the lobby like tourists waiting for a guide, a woman who looked like a girl welcomed us. Her heart-shaped face, breathy, high-pitched voice and curls that faded from baby pink to crimson red were completely incongruous with her station. She was drowning in ruffles and bows, and she even smelled pink. Cloying sweetness like burnt sugar, cotton candy and too much vanilla that announced her arrival and lingered long after she left.

"Hello, everyone. I'm Alyssa Twik, and I'll be your liason. My official title is 'Tribute Wrangler', but 'liason' sounds so much more dashing, so please call me that!"

She looked around for approval. We all nodded uncertainly.

"I'll walk you through the different stages before the Game, and make sure all the behind-the-scenes things go smoothly, like returning you to your District if the odds aren't in your favor."

She clasped her hands, which had this weird sort of body paint so her fingers had the same coloration as her hair.

"Great! First things first, you'll all be given the intake examination, just to make sure you're healthy enough to play and make sure you're not carrying any filthy, disgusting District diseases or vermin. You'll also be given a tracking device. Do not remove it under any circumstances."

Another look round, more nods from us.

"I'll give you more information as the situation requires, but it's really quite an intuitive process, optimized especially for the varying intelligences of the Districts. Enjoy your stay, and may the odds be ever in your favor!"

All said with the brightest, sugariest smile you've ever seen. I hated her immediately.

She herded us into the stark, spacious lab, with twenty four teams of techs at the ready. We were all weighed, measured, and given a diet plan and training regimen to gain or lose weight and muscle in time for the Games. After the mandatory de-lousing shower, our clothes were taken away and replaced with soft, non-descript shirts and pants. Cream for the girls, green for the guys, with large black numbers on the arms and back denoting our Districts.

Before we were dismissed, a small black bar was inserted into my left forearm, just below the elbow. The anesthesia was the most alarming thing, even more so than the subdermal punch that created space for the tracker. It felt like a patch of my arm simply didn't exist any more. I couldn't bring myself to watch the punch, but when the giant needle containing the tracker went in, it was like watching a film. The tech repeated the warning not to tamper with it, and told me it would be deactivated as soon as I left the Arena.

Our teams led us down the winding corridors to our rooms, which were small and efficient. A smaller main room with a bed, nightstand and a main console tucked discreetly into a corner, and a larger bath/ prep room, complete with barber's chair and a floor to ceiling mirror on the far wall. Even though it was pared down to the essentials, I'd never seen such technology. The console controlled everything in the room: air temperature and humidity, lights (from pitch black to so bright it made you squint), room service (anything from food to medicine to entertainment). I played around with it a bit, accidentally sending up a baked ziti (it smelled amazing, but I wasn't hungry enough to eat any), and then wandered into the larger space.

The shower head was two feet across, embedded in the ceiling and had about a billion different modes, from a gentle misting to a torrential downpour, flanked by movable massaging heads on the shower walls. There was no faucet or tap, but a small eight by eight inch panel on the wall which controlled the temperature, timer and pattern of the water. I was captivated. Back home, we still had the tap and a lone shower head; whether or not you got hot water was entirely dependent on whether you were first or second in. Of course, I took it for a spin. Pure, distilled and concentrated heaven, washing away the clinging, bitter, antiseptic odor of the delousing shower.

I went back into the first room to find a small pill and glass of water waiting on the bed, along with a note:

"We understand that you may have trouble adjusting to such modern conveniences as we've provided. This tranquilizer will help you settle in. Please report to the gymnasium by 7 am tomorrow, as many of you have lots of work to do if you want the odds to be in your favor.

Sleep well!

~Alyssa Twik, Tribute Liason Extraordinaire

It was unnerving to have things appear and disappear at someone else's will.

I popped it, gulping the water, and crawled into bed. I sank like a stone. The sheets were thick and silky, just warm enough to feel like I was floating, just cool enough that I wouldn't overheat.

The pill took effect more quickly than I anticipated. I closed my eyes and woke up the next morning, expecting it to still be night.

We herded down to the gymnasium. It was truly enormous. Stations for different weapons, defenses, basic skills like making a shelter or a fire were scattered around along with rows and rows and rows of treadmills, weight benches, and a wide track circling the entire operation, manned by perky trainers with swinging ponytails or shirts that looked like they'd rip off if the guy if they flexed a single muscle. Upbeat, non-descript music floated. I figured I would pick up a ranged weapon like archery, but I couldn't get the hang of it; every arrow clattered to the floor a few feet in front of me. Spears and throwing knives were much more my speed.

We met our prep teams near the end of the second week of training. They manage your public image, before and, if you're Victor, after the Games. Image is absolutely everything. You make your first impressions at the presentation before the beginning of the Games. The flashier and more confident you are, the easier it is to get sponsors. They're the ones who send the gifts in the Games, which get more and more expensive as each day goes by and fewer Tributes are still alive. They can be the difference between you having a melee weapon or slowly starving to death.

Meghan came in like an extremely organized whirlwind that was late for an appointment. I was exhausted just watching her. She was tiny; slim and short, even with heels. She was very pale; all her color seemed to be in a dusting of freckles, her deep auburn hair and hazel eyes, which sparked with an intensity I wasn't sure I wanted to get on the wrong side of. Within ten minutes, she had laid out the general scheme for the presentation (already coordinated with Doe's team, of course), my general public demeanor, and had a bunch of ideas for my victory tour.

I made the mistake of questioning whether victory tours were thinking a bit too far ahead.

"Annek, are you planning on dying in the Arena? Because if you are, I'll go find a tribute who's willing to work at getting home again. I am not here to waste my time and talent on someone who's not even half as invested as me, and I'm just a stylist." She practically hissed.

My mouth dropped open. No one had been so blunt about it so far. It seemed like everyone, from Dahlia Henry, our escort, to Alyssa Twik, the terminally perky 'liason', would phrase 'your senseless, grisly murder at the hands of another teenager' as 'if the odds aren't in your favor.'

"Well, yes or no, Annek? And close your mouth, you'll catch flies."

"Y-yeah." I stammered. I hadn't really processed the idea of living. All through training, the Careers, even Diamond, the fourteen year old girl from One, looked absolutely lethal with whatever they got their hands on. I was pretty good with a knife and a knot and I could run for hours, but really, I didn't stand a chance and I was one of the oldest, along with the guy from Seven, Moss, and the girl from Ten, Erica.

"Good. Now let's see about that hair. Ugh, it's so stringy."

As I was buffed, plucked, shaved and deep conditioned, I wondered vaguely if Meghan would always be this brusque.

"So, yours and Doe's theme is going to be Roman mythology, drawing on District Four's history in fishing. You'll be Neptune, and Doe will be a sea nymph. I expect you to practice carrying yourself in your costumes. You will move with confidence and grace, maybe a hint of swagger. No, a lot of swagger. This is your time, this is your Game, so own it."

I was on board. "Roman mythology" was a bunch of gibberish to me, but if I wasn't half-drowned and covered in starfish like all our other Tributes had been, I was good. But something that had been gnawing at me was out before I could stop it.

"What.. what about Doe?"

The room stopped buzzing abruptly, and a comb clattered to the floor. Nikita and Avalon, hairdresser and skin specialist respectively, just gaped and shot worried looks to Meghan, who put down her razor and sighed. Her voice was low and firm, but her eyes burned with such fierceness I shrank back in my seat for a moment.

"Annek, I'm going to level with you, because if there's one thing you deserve, it's the uncoated, ugly truth. These Games are brutal, and Doe is thirteen. She's squeamish about baiting hooks. I say this with all the sympathy in the world for you two, but she is going to die. You can try and protect her all you want, but either you will kill her, or someone else will. There is no magic ending here where you both survive. It does not work out that way. Ever. You need to focus on surviving yourself. The tributes you are going up against are nothing to play with. The Careers are all nearly as old as you. It means they have eleven, fourteen years of training, day in and day out, for this moment, for these games. They know how to handle knives, swords, spears, bows, traps, everything and anything you can think of. There is no room for nobility here. There is no room for compassion. There is no room for mercy. The sooner you realize this, the better chance you have of making it out alive. I'm sorry, but there is no other way."

It was like a sledgehammer. All the words I had in my head about duty, and loyalty, and the promises to myself just vanished. They all felt so suddenly... naïve. Meghan gave me one last look, half sympathy and half "wise up", and returned to shaving the other half of my face.

It was almost sick how there was thirty seconds of silence, and then talk was bubbling along just as fast as ever.

After a tense half hour (at least for me), I was set free to wander, although Meghan cautioned that I should spend as much time as possible learning different weapons and perfecting the ones I already knew. Adaptability was everything.

I was tempted to go up to the rooftop garden, but there were cameras everywhere and I had no desire to see little pitch black lenses staring at me. I decided it really couldn't hurt to go back to the gym.

The days passed quickly, and a gnawing sort of darkness crept over everything. The feeling of something immense, old, terrible and nameless right behind you was inescapable. Most of the Tributes were pleasant enough with each other, but as the Games were only a day or two away, distrusting, calculating glances and open hostility from the Careers reigned. Each District kept to its own, except for the worryingly large group, made of Districts One through Three and Five, and Moss, the guy from Seven. They trained together, they ate together, and they more resembled a pack of wolves than week and a half-old acquaintances. It's an odd thing, watching people imagine your death, and it makes your blood run cold when you heard a low voice and see seven pairs of eyes staring.

The Trials came and we all went in one by one to perform for the Gamemakers who reduced us to a number, 1 through 10. Since they go in order, District One through Twelve, guy then girl, I didn't have too long to wait. Alyssa called my name in the sugary sweet, grating voice of hers. I heaved a sigh, flashed a comforting smile to Doe and walked into the gym.

It was eerie. Usually the gargantuan gymnasium was full of grunts, the clash of metal against metal, thuds of punches landing on dummies, the whir and hum of machines, the clang and snap of traps going off, but now it was dead quiet. The soaring ceiling, made of glass so the cameras could peer through and speculate to breathless audiences about our progress, amplified every minute noise into echoing reverberations. My footsteps rang out until I switched my stride. Toe-heel, toe-heel... soundless. There was a dissipating cloud of smoke from the something or other the girl from Three had set off. The Gamemakers sat at a long, long table on the far side of the gym. Seneca Crane, the Head Gamemaker, was in the center. It was only six tributes in, and they were visibly bored. I felt a bit sick.

"When you're ready." I couldn't tell who said it.

I walked over to the table and picked up two hunting knives, stout and long. I gauged their weight, found the balance points, and sized up my target, a brown burlap dummy about six yards away. I rushed in swinging. As fast as I could manage, I slashed across the throat with my right, down the abdomen with my left and buried my right into its chest, right above the heart. I ripped it back out, spun around to gain momentum and hurled both knives at another, identical dummy about three yards away. My left grazed a shoulder before falling, but the right missed entirely and clattered to the floor, ringing in the air. I'd been practicing becoming ambidextrous, with my right arm as strong as my left, but it still wasn't as good as I hoped.

I cursed under my breath and stole a glance at the Gamemakers. One on the far left was scribbling something, and two on the right were whispering to each other.

"Are you finished?" It was a different voice, but I still couldn't tell who said it.

I couldn't end on such a pitiful note. I shook my head and jogged to the table with various rope, string, twine and wire. I picked up a fragile looking filament; a tripwire that recoiled and became a garrotte with the slightest pressure. I hustled to set the trap, and I did it in about two minutes. It was almost invisible, slung between two posts about ten feet apart. It looked more like a strand of spider silk than steel. Stretched within millimeters of its breaking point, it had just enough elasticity to roll up or down and snap around a neck, but it was thin and tough enough to be sharper than a razor. The thick, rudimentary dummy was balanced on casters, easily rolling. I gave it a gentle kick into the wire, and the reaction was almost too quick to see. It snapped at the friction points at the edges of the posts and coiled, ripping through the rough burlap like tissue paper, disappearing and leaving the fabric puckered inwards. The dummy slowly rolled to a stop; the head wobbled slightly, and fell with a soft thud onto the floor, spilling white batting with a puff. Demonstrating on the dummy brought the last two weeks into grim reality. Sooner or later, that would be a person being decapitated. I broke out in a cold sweat, bowed, and left the room.

I gave Doe a big smile to encourage her as she bounded up and into the gym. When she came out her face was wan and her eyes were red, and I was too afraid to ask. She just went back to her room.

Later that night, we heard the stats: I scored a six, points lower than the Careers, who averaged eights and Diamond, the District One girl, scored a nine. District Twelve, usually the lowest scorers, got three and four, respectively. Doe scored a two.

We ate in silence and went to bed for the last night of good rest we'd get for a very long time.

It was late afternoon the next day when Meghan commandeered me for the Presentation prep. She thrust my costume into my hands and waited expectantly as I pulled on the leather skirt and strapped on the sandals. I stood on a low dais in the middle of the room as three artists went to work on my makeup. They spent hours tracing liquid blues, greens, teals, silvers, blacks, golds and grays in intricate patterns across my chest and arms, down my fingers and up my neck, tendrils snaking onto my face. Meghan handed me a mirror. My skin had been transformed from its regular tan to... fishy. Scintillating colors suggested scales reflecting watery light. I had a crown of deep red, angular coral and I was taken aback. I actually looked noble, and a little feral. Meghan was beaming.

We walked to the bays under the stadium seating, my heart crashing around my chest with every step I took. The roar of the throng outside and above leaked through inches of metal. It was primal and fierce; even if they pretended otherwise, they were calling for our blood. We reached District Four's bay. My chariot was, like me, evocative of the sea. It was effectively a giant hunk of coral reef being pulled by horses who'd gotten a similar treatment: they were dark, wet seaweed replacing manes and tails. Meghan handed me a trident; wooden, heavy with metal and coral. I looked around for Doe. I spotted her in an instant. Her look was even better than mine. She was golden, blue and rose pink: a statue, wrapped in blazing white toga. Her chariot was an ornate oyster shell, the mother of pearl inside gleaming brightly. She held a pearl almost as big as her head and had hundreds of tiny pearls and gems woven into her hair. She looked like a fey doll; a dangerous plaything for a princess. A tiny ray of hope sprang up; maybe we could make it out alive after all.

We were all in place, waiting.

A faint voice, more bass than anything, rang out above the thrum of the crowd.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you the Tributes for the 59th Hunger Games!"

The roar of the crowd, already loud enough to be uncomfortable, became actually painful. The huge metal doors lifted, revealing the field, where Districts One through Three were heading out. My horses lurched forward; they'd been here before, were used to the screams and flashes. Doe's chariot fell in line with mine. I was blinded by cameras flashing in my face, and then I remembered Meghan's coaching. I set my face in what I hoped was a savage, stoic look, but it was probably more constipated than anything. As the sun was setting below the rim of the stadium, I stole a glance at some of the other tributes. District One, Ore and Diamond, were in what looked like colossal diamonds, the facets catching and reflecting the last rays of the sun, making it look like they burning alive, encased in glass.

District Three had elegant hovering chariots, sleek and glossy, drawn by three horses each.

Across the field, two lumps of black rolled slowly around the track. The riders were both smudged and gray, with sickly, dim yellow headlamps shining on dusty black horses; 'coal' from District Twelve.

As soon as it began, it was over; Doe and I were back in the bay and hugging like we'd actually accomplished something. Meghan and Hannah, Doe's stylist shoved us back out onto the field where we filed with the other tributes onto the stage for the pre-game interview.

It was a similar blur. It was the first time we met Caesar Flickermann. Any stray hair on him was chartreuse, his chosen color for our Games, and it was unnerving; he looked moldy. He was stocky and squat, a gregarious ball of sick-looking green and wrinkles. I tried to pay attention to the other Tributes and strategize a bit, but I kept thinking about how I might never see anyone I loved ever again, and that the last they saw of me would be getting an arrow in my eye or my throat slashed or disemboweled, for absolutely no reason at all. The more I thought about it, the angrier I got, until I practically spat my answers at Caesar. He moved on pretty quickly. Meghan told me later it came off in sync with my costume, but I was livid.

After the interview, Alyssa met with us all one last time.  
>"Hello everyone! Tonight is your last guaranteed night, so use it wisely, get rid of any regrets, live it up! Tomorrow you'll go into the Arena. The Game begins at dawn, so be ready before then, of course. You'll be provided one set of clothing and the opportunity to gather anything you could possibly need or want. You will rise onto the playing field via platforms that discourage cheating. Please don't move until the highly visible timer expires and you hear the cannon sound. Otherwise, you'll be disqualified immediately. Once the Game has begun, nothing you find in the Arena is off-limits, and of course, the Game continues until a Victor is determined. Deaths will be signaled by the same cannon, and a recap of the day gets shown every night, so be aware. You'll know when the Games have ended. May the odds be ever in your favor!"<p>

She flounced off and left us to think over all the possible meanings of "disqualified".

That night I tried hard to sleep, but the thought that tomorrow would probably be the last day I'd ever see weighed rather heavily. A piercing ache for home, for burying my feet in the sand and the sea air in my lungs, for my family, for Georges and Max and ...Lina.

God, I missed her. All I wanted at that moment was to hold her in my arms, run my hands through her hair. We'd met up the night before the Games, like we had the last year. It was our little tradition, just in case we got picked, to have one last night together. Neither of us really believed that we'd be chosen: it was an excuse more than anything to fool around. There were so many kids who'd taken tesserae when we hadn't, it seemed almost impossible. We hadn't done much. I'd stayed over at her house because she was an only child, and her parents were at a party somewhere. I was always a bit jealous of the space she had, since there were five of us crammed in a three bedroom cottage and I didn't even have my own room; I shared with Marcus. At least it was homey.

I wondered what life would be like without me. If I'd even be remembered, or go the way of most of our other Tributes: forgotten, the holes they left filled up with other, living people, like they never really existed to begin with.

My mind drifted to what kind of death I would meet. Maybe I'd go peacefully, and be killed in my sleep. I just hoped that I wouldn't die in the first few minutes. Given the chance, I could survive.

Doe kept coming up. If I followed what Meghan wanted, I'd leave the Cornucopia as soon as the Games started, and I'd hopefully never see her. I wouldn't be hindered with building shelters for two or sharing food, or covering two sets of tracks. It seemed cowardly. I knew then that if I didn't at least try to keep Doe alive, I could never face anyone in District Four again.

I had just talked myself into drifting off when Meghan came and woke me up. I shuffled through dressing; a plain, cornflower blue tunic, pants, and dark brown leather boots, and June's cowrie shell necklace around my neck, and the last outfit I'd ever wear was complete. Every step I took, everything I did had a new, precious urgency, searing itself into my mind like it would matter.

I was walking that long, lonely hall with Meghan. We turned a corner I'd passed by many times without a second thought, and ended up in a bare room containing just the metal and glass tube that would carry me to my death, and two black-clad Peacekeepers, hulking and stoic, to prevent last ditch efforts at escape. We waited for the door on the tube to open, and the fact that in minutes, twenty two people would be actively seeking my death became horrifyingly...real. Every passing moment I grew more and more terrified until I'd broken out in a cold sweat, shaking uncontrollably, hyperventilating and rooted to the spot. The door slid open, revealing a steel platform with concentric circles carved into the surface. I couldn't move to step onto it; hot tears of pure, blank fear sprang into my eyes, stinging. I realized I was babbling, a string of nonsense and pleas.

A hard slap knocked me out of it.

"Annek, you'll make it home, if I have to drag you myself." Meghan was as earnest as I'd ever seen her, and something about it made it a little easier to breathe. I slowly regained some semblance of composure, hugged her one last time and stepped on the glossy steel platform. I watched her as she disappeared from sight, and was left alone in the pitch black of the slowly rising tube.

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><p><strong>AN: A big thanks to all the people who've reviewed so far, and the unsinkable Mother Crumpet for beta reading.**


	10. A Going Concern

It was just after dawn, the sun still burning red a little bit above the horizon. The platform stopped, and looked around at the Arena. It was breathtaking.

A meadow full of tall grass and willowy, weedy flowers, blowing in the wind. All of the Tributes were standing on platforms like mine, in a wide, wide circle around the Cornucopia, glittering brilliantly in the rising sun. The districts were all mixed up. Colleen, the twelve-year old from Eleven was on my right, and Abarrane, the sixteen-year old from Seven was on my left, each about a hundred yards away. I couldn't see Doe. Scattered through the food, weaponry and packages, were smaller boxes wrapped in metallic paper with our names printed neatly: I saw one for Frieda, but not mine or Doe's. I knew I had no chance at the the better prizes nearer to the monumental horn, so I tried to pick out useful things as far away as possible. I couldn't just run off without anything. The giant screen above us was in the last 15 seconds of the countdown when I saw a flash of red fall out of the corner of my eye. The next instant an explosion nearly knocked me off the platform and I felt a lot of something wet hit my face and right side. I was momentarily dazed, blinded and panicking and deaf, tasting copper.

Colleen had dropped her ball, her memento of District Eleven, and set off the mines surrounding the platform. The wetness covering my whole right side was all that was left of her. A cannon sounded a second later, but no one moved. The timer had stopped at 13, barely visible through thick brown smoke that hung heavily in the air.

A voice, placid and sugary sweet, echoed from the hovering screen.

"Again, please remain stationary until the timer has run out and the cannon has signaled the beginning of the Games. Otherwise, you face disqualification."

I struggled to focus, intent on regaining my composure and plan. I tried to wipe the blood out of my eyes. Everything sounded incredibly far away, nearly drowned out by the high-pitched ringing.

The timer above resumed counting down.

3... 2... 1.

The bell sounded and I was off like a shot. All I needed was the box with my name and rope for a net, I could scavenge the rest. I was tilting wildly, still unbalanced from Colleen. At least the smoke was providing just enough of a screen.

I couldn't waste time looking for much in particular. I saw a knife and grabbed it. A large backpack that looked empty.

The first few Careers reached weapons and the slaughter began.

I realized I was getting dangerously close to the Horn. I looked up to see my box in the hands of a smaller girl, from Eight, I think. My mouth fell open and I was about to shout instinctively when a spear erupted from her chest and pinned her to the ground like a butterfly under glass. My present skittered away. I locked eyes with the giant working the spear out of her back, Ore from One. I ran while I had a little bit of time, my legs pumping furiously, towards my box and the relative safety of the woods. I picked up Pell's box out of instinct by the satiny ribbons. I felt something sharp trace its way across my right shoulder, and I think I screamed, but I was at the treeline now and didn't dare look back. For a while I just ran blindly, crashing through dense underbrush. I thought I heard rustling that wasn't me. I swore I could feel someone breathing down my throat, a step behind me, about to strike, and I'd flinch every so often. I only stopped to catch my breath and shove everything in the pack. Even then only slowed to a brisk walk. I was too scared to think about eating. My heart was beating so fast it felt like it was humming. Cannons were going off pretty regularly, up to nine, including Colleen. Almost half of us were gone, and it'd only been a few hours.

Adrenaline carried me much further than I'd ever go otherwise. The terrain was changing, from the soft groundcover of fallen, rotting leaves to dampness and moss and pebbles. Trees were sparser and thinner, craggy. Wizened, fighting for purchase and sunlight in the shadows of hulking, tumbled, jagged boulders. I stopped and looked back. I had been running up a gentle slope for some time, a truly enormous mountain. At least I figured it must be. I'd never seen one before. My ward in District Four was all flat coast or gently rolling hills. The weather had changed as well. It wasn't as warm, but it was very humid, almost waterlogged. There was a mist rolling in, adding to the off-kilter, claustrophobic feel.

I realized I heard the familiar sound of water. Not the crashing of surf, and there was no salty tang in the air, but the distinctive roar of a lot of water falling very far. I couldn't tell if it was my mind, breaking from sheer, prolonged terror, or if there was really was someplace nearby. I followed it for a while, trying to calm my own ragged breathing to something approaching quiet. The day was getting on, and my hearing was still dulled from the explosion earlier, though it seemed like it was slowly returning. I kept glancing around, thinking I heard the snap of a twig, or a squish of heavy feet on the moss. No one. I didn't dare hope I'd escaped from the Cornucopia alone... Alone. The word crashed through my brain, grinding my suddenly shaky legs to a halt. I'd left Doe at the Cornucopia to be slaughtered. All the promises I'd made to myself, my plans for how this would go, the one piece of morality and honor I wanted to protect, gone. I was a coward, and I left a thirteen year old girl, one I knew personally, one I knew was dear to so many people... I left her to die alone.

I dropped to my hands and knees, the backpack smacking me in the back of the head. Darkness swirled in the edges of my vision. Desperation set in. If I passed out, someone would kill me. Through sheer force of panicked will, the darkness receded. I realized how very, very thirsty I was. My throat was painfully parched, and my lips were cracked. It's possible she's not dead yet, I told myself. I'd only know for sure if I saw her face at the end of the day. Until then, I'd assume she'd escaped.

I rose, still shaking, to my feet and wandered in the direction of the water. I hadn't run into or been followed by anyone, from what I could see or hear, but I gripped my knife tightly all the same. Boning knives are no good for hand-to-hand combat. The blade is long, flexible, thin and tapered, closer to a stiletto. It's curved, meant to strip meat efficiently from bone with gentle, horizontal strokes. Stabbing anything with it would probably snap it. The moss underfoot was springy; my footsteps were disappearing a few meters behind me. A little further ahead through the dim, damp landscape, there seemed to be an open space. My first thought was I had gotten turned around and had headed back to the Cornucopia, but the sound of a waterfall and sense of space was unmistakeable.

About a quarter of a mile more, and the ground nearly fell out beneath me. About 30 steep feet below sprawled the pebbly beach of a very large lake. It stretched far enough that there was a green island somewhere near the middle and the cliff behind it was black, grayed out by fog, with a giant strip of white on the cliff face and the tiny ripples hitting the shore indicative of the power of the waterfall. I picked my way down slowly. Scree and loose boulders threatened to bury me with every step; it took me about a half hour to get down. I gasped my way over to the water. It was crystalline and deep. A shallow slope, covered in gravel and sparse water weeds dropped off suddenly to deepest navy. It was breathtaking. If the whole Arena wasn't choked with death, I might have been happy here. I dipped a hand, and it was cool. I waited for a moment, to see if the water suddenly turned to acid or something came roaring from the abyss, but nothing. I drank. It was the sweetest water I had ever tasted, almost like light liquified; pure and cold and utter heaven. I drank until I was sated and my hands were numb from cupping it, feeling refreshed. I ripped off my shirt. I had sweated off most of the blood and gore from earlier, but my shirt was still coated; dark, rusty-looking stains blossomed all along the right side, and my hair was matted in bunches to my face. I checked my shoulder; something had left a red and angry scratch- maybe an arrow?-, but it looked harmless. I kicked off the leather boots, stashed them in the pack, which seemed waterproof. I waded in about waist high, expecting the water to be a shock, since water that was cold enough to drink and numb my hands was dangerous to swim in, but it was pleasantly warm. Not as hot as a hot-spring, but relaxing and balmy all the same. I figured it was a trick of the gamemakers, and if they were giving me warm water to bathe in that was cool to drink, I wasn't about to complain. I swished my shirt around, watching a dark cloud form as it became cleaner. I noticed scores of fry and fingerlings in the shallows, darting back and forth in masses of shadows in the clear water against the light, pebbly shore. They looked like bluegill or bass, both of which were easy enough to catch, and this many in the shallows meant this was a well-stocked lake. I was getting slightly wary of this sort of good fortune. I watched the surrounding hill of scree. Being on the low ground gave me a serious disadvantage, but anyone coming down would make a hell of a racket, and if they were in too big of a hurry, it would bury them alive. There were boulders and giant sheared-off slabs of rocks dotting the wide shore- perfect cover.

What I wanted to do was get to that island and wait it out. If I could just stay here, I had a reasonable chance of defending and surviving.

I waded back onto shore, looking around for anything that would be useful. Fires were risky, but would probably be necessary to dry everything out; it was temperate but very humid here. Closer to the scree piles, there were a few black rocks that stood out from the gray and brown ones that made up the beach. I picked one up. One side looked normal, if charred. The other side however, was glossy onyx, a mostly flat surface where the rock had broken. Obsidian. When I was younger, I used to troll along the beaches for rocks and shells with June. Occasionally we'd run across sea-glass made of obsidian, the normally sharp edges washed smooth by the sea. Even now, some people still made knives and jewelry and things out of it, though they were strictly controlled by the Peacekeepers. I stashed the grapefruit sized rock in my pack, along with a few others. Hopefully I'd have time to make a better weapon.

The backpack, a dull, pasty blue, was indeed waterproof. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. This was too much good fortune. I packed everything I wanted to keep dry inside, and tried to gauge the distance to the island. Maybe a half an hour's swim? The sun was getting low, and I realized I was getting light-headed. Dashing around like a terrified cat and not eating was taking its toll. I figured it would be safer on the island. Even if someone came tumbling down the scree, Doe and I had the advantage of knowing how to swim.

I waded in again, watching for any nasty surprises. When none appeared, I pushed off, settling into the ground-covering butterfly crawl. Breath, two strokes, breath, two strokes. It took a bit to adjust to the backpack weighing me down and dragging in the water, but soon I was up to speed. The island was just a little closer every time I stopped to recover, until I was three-quarters there. I decided to push through to the end. Breath, stroke, stroke. Breath, stroke, stroke.

I became aware of a voice singing, so softly at first I thought I was imagining it. A delicate, haunting, unearthly melody, every time I was fully submerged, drowning out the ringing from the explosion earlier. The more I noticed it, the more enraptured I was, and I forgot everything else. No one was hunting me, I wasn't exhausted or hungry, I forgot the rhythm, arms and legs flailing wildly. It was just this voice, beckoning, calling from some underwater cavern. I had to go to it had to find whoever was singing. I couldn't help myself, it was too beautiful to ignore. I began to dive. A hand, or a foot, or maybe an elbow popped out of the water for one little second, and I came back to myself, like wrenching awake from a nightmare. My lungs were screaming for air, and my muscles were burning. I tread water, trying to catch my breath. I had gotten turned around, and was heading back to the deepest part of the lake, between the shore and the island. A cold, slinking fear came over me then. Of course something would be off about this place. The gamemakers wouldn't give us anything without an exorbitant price. I was so tired.

The butterfly crawl was fastest, but I didn't dare be fully underwater again. I switched to the front crawl, which was slower and more tiring, but kept at least part of me out of the water at all times.

It felt like forever, but eventually I reached the island's sandy shore, exhausted.

I dragged myself up and out of the water, collapsing a few feet away, and lay there for some time.

The sun was low, setting over the cliff. It was still temperate, but I forced myself up anyway. I needed to find food, shelter, and make sure this island wasn't inhabited by anyone or anything else.

I pulled my socks and boots back on and trudged towards the center of the island. There was low, lush foliage with sparse trees. I trudged right by them, until something told me to look up.

There, in the waning light of the sunset, near the top of the tree were clusters of young green and ripe brown coconuts. I'd been walking right by food for about five minutes.

I was so happy I hugged one.

The hard part would be getting up to them. I debated taking off my pants and using them as a counterlever to shimmy up the tree, but I was utterly spent, and chances are I'd get a third of the way up and fall and break my neck. If I was going to die here, it would not be pantless.

I took off the backpack and got a few of the rocks out. I congratulated myself on getting hefty rocks. I sized up the distance. The most promising cluster was about 15 feet up, and I heaved a rock towards it, hoping to knock it down. In that moment, I realised that the Arena was probably filthy with tracker jackers and I had no idea if any were around here. The first rock overshot. It missed an impressive number of coconuts, smacked into the trunk, and got trapped above the cluster. I cursed, and listened for a long moment. There was no angry buzz or whir of tiny wings, which was a relief. I only had two others and the obsidian rock, and I needed all of them. If this one didn't work, I wasn't sure what I'd do.

I heaved it up with all my might, and heard a crack as it split a coconut, but didn't drop it. The rock landed with a thud under the tree, and I tried again. A thud, followed by three more as the rock hit the ground, followed by two brownish coconuts.

I gathered them up, stashing them in my pack. I thanked my lucky stars there weren't any insects, and went inward to set up a camp.

It wasn't long, maybe five more minutes, and the trees thinned into another pebbly beach. This time, however, it was an expansive pond, mimicking the larger lake the island was sitting in. A miniature iceberg floated in the middle of it.

Apparently the island was tiny, less than half a mile across. I hadn't come across tracks or signs of anything living.

It was dark now. I cleared a space in the sand for a fire and set about looking for some kindling.

Deadfall from the coconut palms, dry bushes, not much else. I gathered what I could and returned to the pit in the sand. I was so glad I had bothered with the firestarting kiosk in the gymnasium during training. After a bit of fiddling, and a few sparks from the back of the knife against a particularly rough rock, and I had a small fire. I gathered a bit more fuel and settled in.

I turned my attention to the coconuts. By attention, I mean I bashed them with the rocks and smashed them together until first the outer shell and then the coir broke open, leaving me what little water didn't spill out and the white coconut flesh. I inhaled it. Fresh coconut is incredibly potent, silky and intense. I was used to the older nuts which were mellowed even further by being prepared and sitting out in the market. It wasn't quite enough; I was still ravenous. I was sick of the taste halfway through the second, but it was food and I was exhausted. I consoled myself with the prospect of fishing in the morning.

I remembered the two boxes from the Cornucopia and pulled them out of the pack. A bit dinged up from the rocks jostling about, but not too much worse for the wear.

They were wrapped with extremely bright paper, with wide satiny ribbons crisscrossing them. A giant tag had our names printed neatly on them in bold, thick lettering.

I tore mine open, half expecting something to spring out at me. Instead, a note lay atop a neatly coiled length of netting, along with some sort of wire with small plastic handles.

Dear Annek,

In accordance with your scores, we present you with a net and a garotte, to use as you will. May the odds be ever in your favor.

The Gamemakers"

I was wary, to say the least. The net was fine, much finer than I could hope to make in the Arena and would be immensely useful trying to fish. I opened Pell's. Inside was a small granola bar, and an 8 ounce water bottle. I fought the urge to smack myself for carrying food around and starving.

"Dear Pell,

In accordance with your scores, we present you with a day's worth of food.

May the odds be ever in your favor.

The Gamemakers'

I stashed the net and food in my pack, and wrapped the garotte around my wrist for easy access. I hoped I could just stay here until everyone killed everyone else, but it couldn't hurt to be prepared.

I was nodding off, in spite of myself. The fire was warm, and I was propped against a tree. Overhead, the giant floating screens flickered on. It was time, and my heart was in my throat. I was suddenly wide awake again.

Colleen appeared first, her name, age (12) and district (Eleven) appearing underneath her face. Her family wouldn't get anything back. She was in pieces in the Cornucopia field.

A boy was next, Eduard, 17, from Twelve.

Abarrane, 16, from Seven was gone.

Rowan, 15, the girl from Six.

Judah, 15, the boy from Ten.

Maemi, 14, the girl from Eight who was stealing my box.

Henley, 12, the boy from Eleven. That District was out.

Ben, 12, and Frieda 13, both from Three. So two Careers down.

That left Caelan, the boy from Six; Pell, the boy from Eight; Umar and Vanya, both from Nine; Erica from Ten; Mala from Twelve, myself, Doe, and the Career group: Ore and Diamond from One, Brutus and Belle from Two, Ulrich and Nan from Five, and Moss from Seven.

Fifteen, most of them Careers.

There was a fierce mix of joy and pride swelling in my heart. She was alive, she was fighting. I would find her, somehow.

I huddled into myself and tried to get a few hours' rest.

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><p><strong>Thanks to everyone who's reviewed and favorited, especially mintjellyfish and the inestimable beta reader, Mother Crumpet :3<strong>


	11. False Positive

"Annek."

It was wet and guttural, almost as if someone was speaking while underwater. It was completely incongruous with the breathtakingly topless woman sitting in the surf gazing down at me. She was framed by the sun directly behind her, late morning.

Well, not sitting, exactly. More propping herself up on sculpted arms, porcelain skin shimmering in the morning light. Lank curls of black hair plastered themselves to her back and face. High cheekbones, thick fans of dark lashes, wide, rosy mouth; she'd have pretty much every girl back home beat, if weren't for the rows and rows and rows of transparent needle teeth every time she opened her mouth. And the wicked looking talons digging into the pebbles on the beach. And the thick, powerful tail that thrashed and beat the water like a cat intent on its prey. Even so...

"Annek, come swimming." She sounded like she was drowning.

"How... do you know my name?" Stupid question, but you think of something to ask a mermaid the moment you wake up.

"Undine has always known it. Come swim."

I realised that she had been dragging me to the water herself. I was splayed out on the beach, and my left calf had burning scratches and shallow punctures from the talons she called nails. I didn't know Mutts could actually talk. Jabberjays were the closest thing, and even they could only mimic and twist what they'd already heard.

Regardless, I was wary; this mermaid looked like a barracuda. The markings on her tail were were the same black stripes on top and black splotches towards the back. Her fin was frayed and ripped., like she'd been fighting. Most disconcertingly, her pure black eyes looked hungry as hell.

I scrambled up. She was actually kind of huge. I was six feet tall, and she, balanced on her arms, came up to my chin.

"What's your name?" Stupid question again, but I couldn't just leave. Turning my back on her would be the last thing I'd do if I did. I started shifting my weight, putting precious inches between us.

"Undine." She burbled. Her talons twitched.

"Well, Undine, while swimming sounds great, I don't have time. Maybe later?" Her tail was thrashing faster and faster, and she was pulling herself out of the water, closing any distance I created.

"Annek, come swimming with us."

Us, it was now. A cold knot of fear appeared in my stomach, and adrenaline started coursing.

"How many are there of you?" Couldn't hurt to find out.

"There is Undine and Undine and Undine. Come swim." She sounded irritated.

I began backing away in earnest, now. At least 3, possibly more. It didn't really sound like these things could talk much or were any sort of smart; she was repeating that same silly phrase over and again.

Watching the mermaid meant I wasn't looking where I was stepping. I tripped over something and fell backwards. Almost instantly, the thing launched itself towards me. She hit me at an angle, slimy and hard, burying her teeth in my bicep. I screamed in pain. I grabbed her arm and tried to throw her off, but I couldn't get any traction. She was ridiculously heavy, 300 pounds at least, pinning my left knee under her hip, where she morphed from female to fish.

The inches-long needle teeth hit bone in my arm and she was scratching at my wrists where I held her off. I kicked with my right leg while I wrenched my left out from under her. I felt my hip strain and prayed it wouldn't pop out of socket. No dice.

I took a chance and let go, driving my fingers with all of my might into her rolling, wide open eye. I felt it give, and a hot rush of fluid. It let out a horrible screech, bubbling through her silvery black blood and my red. She opened her mouth just enough that I could rip my arm free, and she fell back, clutching her ruined eye(doing more damage in the process) and whipping and flopping on the stones and pebbles. I scrambled away, but not before getting smacked on the back by the flailing tail. My fingers found a hefty rock and I threw it as hard as I could. It struck the mermaid on the back of its skull but didn't have any noticeable effect. I grabbed another and tried again. And again, and again. It hit square on the nose and I heard a sickening crunch. The noise it was making stopped abruptly. It seized wildly, and I attacked, hitting it over and over again until its head was mush. It was limp and still, the hands hanging from where the talons had dug into the mermaid's skin.

I stood up, not daring to breathe, primed to attack again. I didn't trust it was dead.

I felt goddamn invincible.

The feeling was shortlived as I swiftly grew lightheaded. I was pouring blood from the hamburger that was my upper arm and the myriad cuts the mermaid had inflicted. I stumbled to the edge of the brush and fell heavily against the palm I was sleeping under the night before.

The world was fading to gray and white around the edges. I tried to tie a tourniquet with the shreds of the sleeve, but I was too weak and only had one useable hand. I rested my head. The pain was fading rapidly. I was cold more than anything.

"Help." It didn't sound like my voice.

Wind in the palms and the waterfall in the distance, nothing more.

I closed my eyes. I was so tired.

"So I guess I'll just die here then. There could have been an epic battle b'tween me n' Ore, y'know. One of your best contentstants who wasn't born a Career against the guy who's - who's prob'ly gonna take it all now. Nawp, some friggin' mermaind."

It probably didn't make much sense, but it was my last, desperate, babbling plea, aimed at the public's need for blood.

More wind. More waterfall. No reply.

I was retreating into myself. It was so cold here. How had I never noticed before?

I felt a thump, and something light and silky covered my face.

Slowly, I opened my eyes and pulled off the parachute.

A tiny tube was sitting on my lap. It took a very long time to realize what it was, and even longer what I should do with it.

I gingerly opened it and squeezed, to reveal a noxious black ooze. It didn't look like it would cover all the wounds the mermaid inflicted, so I went to work spreading it over my bicep, where I needed the most .

It burned. Oh, it burned. It was painful enough I seriously considered just letting myself bleed out. I pushed on, until the entire mermaid bite was covered in screamingly painful goo.

It acted like a kick. My eyelids stopped fluttering and I could hold my head up without it lolling all over the place. I was still weak, but I was alert again, and the fresh pain was fading to manageable levels.

I used up the last of the tube on the deeper cuts, like the gouges in my lower arms. I wished there was more just to have around, but I was satisfied with still being alive.

My arm, however, was toast. I could barely lift it; I couldn't even maintain a fist. The bone seemed unbroken, but it was very close to useless. I wrapped the shreds of my sleeve around the wound, tightening the knot with my teeth. The pressure seemed to soothe it a bit.

I kicked myself for not stockpiling more food last night. The coconuts were utterly unreachable now, and even if I did knock some down, I couldn't open them. I debated eating Pell's granola bar, and settled on half of it. I turned my attention to planning.

Was it wise to stay here? Certainly not on the ground. It was safe to assume the gamemakers weren't happy I was holed up on an island when (as far as I knew at least) Doe and I were the only ones who could swim. A horrible thought occurred to me then, and I scrambled up.

As I suspected, the island was sinking.

I remembered distinctly that I killed the mermaid two or three feet away from the water, but now it was lapping at her fin.

Panic set in again. I couldn't possibly make a half hour's swim, but at the rate it was sinking, in less than a day the whole island would be underwater and I wouldn't have a choice. I looked around. More time than I thought had passed. By the sun, it was early afternoon.

I was exasperated, exhausted, ravenous, and more than a little angry at the gamemakers, but there was nothing for it but to figure out a way to survive.

I couldn't swim on my own, but if I could find a smallish piece of driftwood, I might be able to use it as a kickboard or sommat. The other, more toothy problem was the two mermaids still in the water.

I settled in near my rough and tumble firepit and arranged the rocks I'd gathered from the far shore. Obsidian flakes off into sharp little knife bits if you can hit it the right way, and that's what I tried to do. Balancing the black rock on its side, for the second time that day I beat the holy hell out of something. Mostly unusable shards flew off, and one drew blood on my face near my mouth, but eventually I was the proud owner of three half palm-sized flakes that were sharp all the way around.

I didn't want to, but I had to finish Pell's granola. I was missing about a pint of blood and was starving anyway. It, unsurprisingly, did little, and I turned my attention to the gory task ahead of me.

I laid out the net, stretching it taut like a picnic blanket. It was not a bad net by any means, with knots that were things of beauty, and I felt a tinge of guilt as I cut squares from it. I made a mental note to fix the damage when I was safe on land again as I balled it up and shoved it back into my bag.

I went over to the dead thing on the shore and started processing the tail. As I suspected, it was all muscle, and the organs were up in the 'human' part of her, the part I couldn't bring myself to mess with. As I cut through the deceptively soft scales to the unsettling burgundy flesh beneath, vile-smelling, green-sheened purple oil leached out onto the pebbly, rocky beach. It completely numbed anything that it touched. I stared in disbelief as the left side of my palm went dead, and my pinky and ring fingers on my bad arm stopped working entirely.

What had I done to deserve this? Couldn't one thing in this blasted Arena not be some overpowered beast that could obliterate me just by existing?

I stabbed the mermaid out of spite and returned to my task with more care. Ten smallish hunks of flesh, tied in the squares of netting were lined up neatly. I stowed them in my present box and the now- poisonous obsidian blades in Pell's. I thought about it, and dipped the boning knife in the purple oil before stowing back in its sheath.

I gathered everything up and trekked to the outer, sandy beach. By now, the water had eaten up most of the beach. There was only a foot or two of sand left before the trees began.

I looked around for about an hour before I found a suitable piece of driftwood. It was crawling with ants, which nearly put me off completely, but it was the only piece big enough to float with me on it and small enough that I could actually pick it up.

I shoved my boots further down in the backpack and squared it up on my shoulders. I attached the knife in its sheath to my bad arm via the garrote, and dragged the driftwood over to the water, splashing off as many of the ants as I could.

It was a bone-dry, and floated without too much difficulty. I waded out until it was a little below chest high and draped my bad arm over, nestled between two branch stumps and the box with the mermaid bits. Painful, but endurable.

This was, without a doubt, the most miserable time. Ants were crawling everywhere, and they were the kind that liked to bite for no reason. It was slow going, what with the driftwood creating drag and wanting to roll over and being ridiculously hard to steer. I kept getting stuff in my eyes and swallowing water and stray insects. Still, I made good time. I was about two-thirds of the way back to shore when a spider the size of my fist appeared on my bad arm.

I've never been too fond of spiders, even when they're tiny. I get June to kill them, each and every one. This one was half-drowned and big enough I could see the malevolence in all eight of its beady eyes. I freaked, and wrenched my arm down and into the water before I could think. The spider flew off and plopped in the water some distance away, but the damage was done. My arm was screaming again, and blood started soaking through the cloth I'd wrapped around it.

Soon after, the mermaids made their appearance. It wasn't bad, at first. I'd see something black and white flash by, feel something rake along my stomach. Then one of them grabbed onto my foot for a moment.

I was already moving as fast as I could manage, but fear spurred me on. I dropped my head under and had a look round. My heart sank.

Two mermaids were circling. Like the one from earlier, they were variations on a fish. And it just had to be lionfish. Undine and Undine and Undine, indeed.

Streamers of white and black flew from jagged spines all along their backs and from wicked spurs on their wrists and elbows and hips. No wonder the barracuda looked like it was on the ropes. Regular, normal lionfish aren't usually hunters. They prefer to defend their little patch of coral and inhale anything that passes by. They don't even have proper teeth- ridges of rough bone is all they need. They won't kill you, but they will make you wish they did. All of their fins and spines are coated in venom that slowly paralyzes the lungs and lights every single nerve on fire while doing it. Being blackhearted, soulless bastards, the gamemakers couldn't leave well enough alone and these mermaids had mouths like the other- gaping abysses of needle teeth.

I hefted one of the net squares, and flung it as far away as I could, which was a few yards off to the right. They flashed away, fighting. Their teeth caught in the net and it bought me precious time.

Not enough, though. Soon, they were back, circling like dogs. They seemed more interested in playing fetch (well, run-and-go-eat-it) than eating me.

I threw another. They were gone a bit longer this time, and returned with gashes like they'd gone at it.

I was so close.

I threw another. This time, one came back faster than the other, which hung back and was missing a hand.

I threw a fourth. This time, furious splashing and a high screech cut short. I was mere yards away from shore, could see the drop off rising up to meet me, was standing upright in waist deep water, when the one that won came back, circling. I threw the fifth, but it didn't see. I dangled the sixth little package in the water and then threw it. It darted away, but not before catching its hip spine on my calf for no goddamned reason at all.

My vision went blurry from the pain. I couldn't even vocalize anything. The need to get out of the water overrode the urge to lay down and die, however, and I dragged myself onto the pebbly beach again, passing a huge boulder I hadn't seen before on the way.

I crawled on hand and knees out of the range of the wavelets lapping, and then collapsed.

I lay there like a dead thing.

I'd made it back to shore, but I was nearly delirious with pain. My arm was dark red again, the bandage soaked through. I was covered in ant bites, had met death by spider and stared it down, and been stung by an overeager mermaid. Things could not, literally could not, get any worse.

Slowly I became aware of the sound of crunching pebbles, someone walking. The sound got louder and louder until it stopped. I wrenched my eyes open to stare at a pair of muddy leather boots.

Well, shit.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: aw, crap. **

**Thanks again to all those who've reviewed so far, and the beta reader from beyond, the interstellar MotherCrumpet.**


	12. Nadir

I woke up where I left myself, surprised to wake up at all.

I sat up with a start and looked around, but the beach was deserted. No figures looming on the scree pile, nothing in the water, no one on the gravel shoreline. Relief that it wasn't the Pack flooded me.

The sun was going down; the day's update would be on soon. I wasn't on the same stretch of beach as when I first came across the lake; I was closer to the waterfall, though it was still a ways off. The roar of it was louder, anyway.

I hefted myself up, nearly losing my balance, catching myself before I fell. Still a little light on blood. I noted that most of my dominant left hand was still paralyzed, and now my third finger was feeling stiff.

It finally sank in with a terrible shock that all of my stuff was gone. All I had left was the garrote. Wrapped as it was, it looked more like a stray piece of cord than a weapon. I felt naked; vulnerable. There was firelight in one of the shelters made by tumbled slabs of rock some distance away. My first instinct was to run the other way and try to start over, but something told me to stop and think it through.

Whoever it was had left me alive. Didn't do a thing to save me (not that they really could), but didn't finish me off either. So that took away the Pack. I didn't really bother with anyone during training, which meant most wouldn't care one way or the other, leaning towards killing me as one less tribute. So that left Doe.

Hobbling barefoot on the stony beach in thoroughly damp clothes towards uncertainty, I desperately hoped I was right.

I reached the opening and peered inside. The fire was weak and low, and I smelled cooking fish. A smallish figure was sitting on the other side, leaping up as she caught sight of me. I froze.

"Annek, you're alive!" Doe was crashed into me, smacking my head against the stone.

"Oof."

"Oh, sorry!" She fussed over me, dragging me to the fire, sitting me down, and shoving a descaled, whole bass fingerling into my hand.

I tore into it, narrowly avoiding the belly. Fingerlings generally aren't good to eat. Being literally the size of your finger, there's simply not much there besides bones and sour guts. But Doe had taken my net and caught scads of them, roasting them over the fire. After a granola bar and two coconuts, it was heaven, if a little bland.

"I'm really sorry for taking all of your stuff. But you passed out and I didn't know if you were dead, and if you were dead there was no point in letting all your supplies go too." She was tripping over her words trying to explain herself.  
>"Relax, it's fine, I'd just like it back eventually." I smiled.<p>

A shadow crossed her face, so quickly I wasn't sure if I had imagined it. "Of course." She smiled brightly, and edged ever so slightly towards the pile of stuff on her side of the fire.

I shrugged it off. She looked good. Still thinner than she should be, and her white-blonde bob was matted and tangled, and her tunic was ripped, revealing a long red scratch, but her big blue eyes were bright and lively. She reminded me of Marcus, all puppy-dog energy and eagerness to be useful.

While I stuffed my face, Doe told me about how she'd fared after Colleen exploded. She'd ran without trying for anything at the Cornucopia and straight into Caelan, the boy from Six a few hours from the start of the Games. They'd struck up a wary partnership. He'd recovered a few boxes from the Cornucopia, including his own, but he wouldn't tell her what was in them. They had wandered for a while but came across a place where the forest jutted up against a vast desert and a field of corn, so they'd gathered what they could, turned around, and holed up for the night near a stream.

"It turned out to be a strid, and he fell in." Doe was looking into the fire between us, skinny arms wrapped around short legs, and I sucked in a breath. Strids are wide, relatively shallow rivers that have turned on their sides, without losing any of their water volume. They look like harmless creeks; four, maybe six feet of burbling water, but they're incredibly deep and fast. Go in, and you don't come out.

Hashing out what we'd seen, the Arena seemed to be made of concentric circles; the meadow with the cornucopia in the center, a ring of forest, and different environments on the outskirts that complemented the Districts. We had the lake, the desert was Ten, and the field was Eleven, probably. The ring was more or less Seven, with lumber.

We fell silent. I continued eating, a small hill of bones growing beside me. I reached for another, but I stopped when I saw her looking from my pile to the rapidly disappearing pile of cooked fish.

I threw the bones onto the fire and wiped my hands on my pants.

By now it was dark, and we crawled outside to look up at the sky. The nightly recap was on, with a musical flourish and Panem's seal.

First up was Umar from Nine, and Vanya, also from Nine. Caelan from Six, and then it was over. Slow day.

That left the Pack, and us, pretty much. I think Erica from Ten, and Mala from Twelve were still alive then too, somehow. We were both doing the math in our heads, and Doe sat ever so slightly straighter, and I was suddenly keenly aware that I was sitting with my back to the entrance of the stone shelter. I shifted so I was leaning against wall. Without other Tributes to hunt, One and Two would be looking for us, and I was barely functioning as it was. Thinking back to training, Ore was the biggest threat. Built like a tank, with all the intelligence and morality of one. He hadn't been counting the days left because he was scared like everyone else; he'd been counting down the days until he could kill. Bella from Two wasn't any better. She had been the one whispering to the others, more often than not- looking at you, through you, like she couldn't wait to watch you bleed. From what I'd seen, she was the lynchpin holding the Pack together. A sociopath like her directing a psychopath like him and backed up with the other thugs in the Pack... things started looking pretty bleak.

Not too long after Caelan's face flashed on the screen, the soothing, saccharine female voice wafted overhead.

"Dearest Tributes, in only two short days, some of you have proven your loyalty, others have proven they're not to be underestimated. Some of you have proven the odds are definitely in your favor, and others, well, not so much. We'd like to reward you. Come to the Cornucopia at 8 AM tomorrow and see what rewards are waiting for you at the Feast!"

Musical flourish, Panel's seal. Silence.

For them to be holding a feast so soon meant they were unhappy with the shake-down. Less than half of us left, and only three or four groups. Usually we lasted longer, or a Career group as big as the Pack would have already splintered.

We made our plan. The Pack was still seven Tributes now, and Doe and I didn't really have a buffer before they came looking. Mala was probably barely alive, and Ten rarely had real fighters. Chances are Erica was playing defense, not offense. Doe was slippery, nimble, and most importantly unhurt. I was quiet when I needed to be, but slower and weaker than I was a day ago. The burning black coagulin I got on the island didn't heal so much as stop the bleeding, but aside from the two paralyzed fingers, I was slowly regaining range of motion. I could make a strong three-fingered fist, at least, and lift my injured arm up to about my shoulder.

We needed stealth, speed, and power. Our best hope was them eating each other, instead of us. The only reason for the Pack to be so big meant they were keeping Nan and Ulrich from Five as human shields. Neither of them scored particularly high, and they didn't show much cleverness in training. If I knew them like I thought I did, Ore and Bella would team up. Brick from Two was too trigger-happy to get along too well with One's Diamond. Thus, Five would be somewhere in the middle, and Brick and Ore would probably kill them before letting them go their own way.

We started undoing the knots in the net. It took hours with us trading off for naps, and it was very late when we finished, but we had the net undone and coiled, the whole half-mile of it. We ate as many of the fingerlings as we could, packed everything up and set off into the night. There was a gnawing sort of finality as I smothered the fire with damp sand and gravel. Doe had my backpack, saying I needed to rest my arm, and it was true. I definitely moved faster without it.

There was early morning fog, and I felt like a ghost. It was hard work getting up the scree pile, and I was suddenly struck with the feeling we really shouldn't be leaving, but we were moving between boulders and hearing the moss squish and then we were in the trees and trying to be quiet and it was too late.

I became aware of the fact that when I ran from the Cornucopia that first day, I had gotten turned around and had been wandering in the least efficient way possible, going back and forth and circling around in the forest ring. It couldn't have been much more than 45 minutes, an hour before we saw the clearing. We stood quietly, not daring to breathe. I didn't hear anyone, and from what we saw, the meadow was deserted. Dead center, the Cornucopia looked like it was glowing faintly in the pre-dawn light.

Doe handed me the coiled netting and a knife I hadn't seen before and disappeared into the meadow. The netting material was thin, weakened by the knots and spliced in a few places (where Doe had fixed the holes I'd cut) and I went to work. I tied the end of it to a tree, then payed out line to another. I wrapped it around and around until the elaston was stretched too taut to vibrate when I plucked it, instead slicing neatly through a few layers of skin and leaving a stinging, leaking line of red on my finger. The material wasn't the same as the one in gym, but the thin, translucent material was invisible in water (the better to trap fish) and was barely visible strung between the trees, looking a little less harmful than a spider's web. It probably wouldn't decapitate anyone, but it would open a throat, hopefully more than one. The thought gave me pause. Up till now, I hadn't seen anyone but Doe, and I was strictly focused on survival, willfully ignoring the reality of the situation. But by the end of this, no matter how things shook out, I'd have blood on my hands. I couldn't think about this though. Not now. I focused on the task in front of me, gritting my teeth as the line bit into my hands as I tightened it.

It was slow work, made slower by the fact I had to rest after each trap. The sun was hazy on the horizon when I was out of netting. Lucky for me, the meadow wasn't too huge, and there were only a few dozen spaces that weren't covered, instead of, say, half.

I crouched in the hollow of a tree and waited. It faced inwards to the meadow, and I was broadside of the golden Cornucopia, where Doe was hidden away. We'd gotten the idea from an older Game, some time in the twenties. It hadn't worked out for that Tribute, who'd gotten butchered trying to escape, but with the traps I set and me ambushing the Pack as a distraction, Doe would have time to get out and we could meet up back at the lake near the waterfall.

I kept looking, scanning the treeline for movement, praying I wouldn't see any. There was now a giant clock hovering above the Cornucopia, and it was reading off 7.25. I clutched the knife Doe had given me, wondering where she'd gotten it from. It was a nasty piece of work- broad, long, with a pyramid point on the end, brass knuckles on the grip and a three-sided blade. The Capitol really didn't play fair- the triangular wounds made by that kind of blade would never heal on their own in the Arena. I willed myself to be as strong and unyielding as the steel in my right hand. If I was going home, if I was going to see my mom or dad or brother or sister or best friend or girlfriend again, the other Tributes would have to die. They were meat, I told myself. They were meat and would die and I was iron. I was iron, not a boy who was spending his nineteenth birthday waiting for teenagers to strangle themselves on trip wires.

"I am iron," I whispered, but it didn't feel any more true when I said it out loud. I touched the garrote around my wrist, feeling the corded leather and handles, remembering the catechism Mags taught me, one of the precious few bits of information she gave me. Inside of the bicep. Inside of the thigh. Inside of the elbow. Either side of the neck. Down the forearm. Down into the throat, and nick the aorta as it arcs out from the heart. Up into the ribs, and lacerate a kidney, collapse a lung, perforate the diaphragm. Cut a muscle, your quarry is weakened, cut a ligament, your quarry can't run. Back of the knee, back of the ankle, back of the skull where it joins the neck. Eyes, nose, and groin for debilitating pain. Joints will disable both of you, as you try to unstick your blade from cartilage and bone. Strike hard, strike to kill. Economy of movement, don't fall into a pattern. Inside of the bicep...

The clock read 7.57, and I saw cornflower blue moving in the trees in front of the mouth of the cornucopia. I shrank back into the hollow of the enormous tree as my heart started humming.

They were overconfident, I knew that much; I could hear them a quarter of the way around the clearing. I gripped my knife harder as I crouched. My legs were starting to burn but I wasn't about to call attention to myself.

"Do you see that?" Brick from Two wasn't even bothering to keep his voice down.

"See what?" The throaty voice of Bella. I prayed they wouldn't see all of them- I was out of a net, and I didn't want it to be in vain.

"Between the trees. There's something there."

"No there isn't. Stop being so paranoid." Diamond, this time. "You're always seeing traps or whatever, and there haven't even been any. You thought those two from Nine or wherever set some, but they didn't even have weapons." She and Doe were the same age, but she already had the smarmy petulance of a sixteen-year-old.

"We haven't seen Four at all, and he scored a six. He could have done something." Brick was defensive now. I hadn't pegged him as paranoid. Or smart. I hoped I hadn't underestimated them all.

"Four's not from the Career part of his District. Neither of them matter." Bella again.

"Is this what you're talking about?" A higher male voice, Ulrich. He was sixteen, but he sounded so young next to the older Careers.

" Yeah."

"Look, it's just a spiderweb." I cringed, waiting for the yelp of pain as it lacerated his hand, but it never came. "See?"

I wasn't entirely sure what to think, but my train of thought was interrupted by a timid gasp right in front of me. I opened my eyes. Mala from Twelve was standing right in front of me, all 4 and a half feet of her, quiet as a mouse. She darted away before I could get a hold of myself, and several things happened all at once.

The announcer's voice was welcoming us all to the Feast as a table materialized in front of the Cornucopia.

Mala was running towards the clearing, heading straight for the last tripwire I tied. I lunged, fingers just grasping the back of her filthy shirt as she clotheslined herself on a tripwire. A spasm of pain jolted my arm as the scabs tore free and the wound reopened from the sudden movement. I watched as her head snapped back when it met the wire. Mala was dead before she hit the ground and skidded forward a bit, blood pulsing swiftly from something that was more wound than throat. I heard myself shout. I heard her cannon go off.

The Careers saw Mala lying on the ground with me standing over her. They split up with Bella shouting commands and pointing furiously; One and Two to grab their gifts and Moss from Seven gunning for me, Nan and Ulrich going for Erica.

I saw Doe streaking past me, with the bag for Four.

Moss was coming, though, screaming a war cry and I couldn't afford to focus on anything else. I had to end it, and quickly, because I wouldn't survive an extended fight, and I needed to get away from Ore and Brick. He had an inch or two on me, thick, corded arms and legs from lumber work in Seven. He was missing a few fingers, but if that was from working or a run-in in the Arena, I couldn't tell.

I crouched as he met me at full tilt, blocking the swinging arm with my left forearm and exploding up with the knife in my right. I buried it in his belly but those arms closed around me and I went down hard, landing with a thump on Mala, feeling something solid give with a crunch as my elbow hit it. I didn't have time to react- suddenly he was towering over me. I heard a cannon, then another, and wondered dimly if it was Doe.

I grabbed a handful of dirt and weeds and bloody mud, flinging them up into his face as I scrambled to my knees and half-lunged, half-fell, catching him low in the stomach and laying him open with a violent jerk and a spray of blood. He made the most piteous sound and fell onto me but I shoved him off and he hit the ground with a choked cough.

I staggered to my feet and ran blindly for the forest, praying I wouldn't hit one of my own traps, but I was through and I could hear the blood crashing in my ears and feel my heart racing and I was alive. I couldn't stop grinning. There were two people dead because of me, but I was flooded with adrenaline and my body was singing as I fell into a loping, ground covering stride. I wanted to shout. I wanted to turn around and square off with someone else. Was this how Ore felt half the time? It was such a massive rush I didn't know how he could stand it. I felt myself slowing down, hoping someone would find me. I heard two more cannons.

My tunic was sticking to my skin, plastered by blood and sweat. I smelled disgusting; sickly sweet and rotting, sour and rank. I realised that the stench wasn't me. I slowed to a stop and leaned against a tree, breathing hard. I jerked my hand away- the trunk was covered in thick, ropey cobwebs dotted with insect shells. Further up the tree and in the webs slung between trees, a whole flock of jabberjays or mockingjays were wrapped in silk and half eaten, swinging in the slight breeze, knocking together like a macabre windchime. I looked around, goosebumps rippling down my arms. The cobwebs were so dense that the early morning sun was darkened and dim.

This was a very bad place.

I was about to turn around when I saw the orange bag with the tag for Four lying abandoned near a tree.

My heart was in my throat. "Doe? Doe!"

There was only the wind in the webs.

"Doe!" I shouted, louder now.

"Not Doe, Four. " I whirled around to face the voice.

Diamond stood a few yards behind me. She was stocky, and a little tall for her age. Her limbs didn't quite seem to fit with her body. I would have mistaken her for a boy with her sandy brown crew cut and wide, plain face, except for her high, sing-songy voice. She had mud or some dark paint in thick stripes across her face, under her eyes.

How had I missed her following me?

The battle joy I'd been going on faltered. Catching a little girl off guard and lucking into it with Moss wasn't the same as squaring off against someone who'd trained for years, not weeks. I was more out of breath than I realized. Diamond was poised for a fight. Stilettos in each hand, her body turned side-faced, daring me to rush at her. If I did, I'd be in the same position that Moss was with me, aiming for a target smaller than me and getting off balance. I needed her to make the first move.

"You killed my Moss and now I'm gonna kill you."

She sounded like she was about to cry, but her jaw was set.

I gripped my knife in my right hand and shifted my weight forward to my left foot. A plan had come to me then- low, vicious, cruel. If I somehow made it out of this place alive, my mother was gonna kill me.

"What, was he your boyfriend or something?" I put as much malice as I could into it.

"He told me he loved me." She sounded so, so young.

She shifted again, grief making her judgment weak and her childish crush seem all the more real and true. I was struck with pity, but I shoved it down and pushed ahead.

I was going to hell anyway, and Doe needed me.

"Oh, please. He was trying to survive. I thought you'd at least be smart, if not pretty."

"That's a lie!" She shouted, halfway to a charge. She caught herself, though, narrowing her gray eyes that were full of tears. In a few years, when she grew into her body, she'd be a stunner, but now she was all odd, gawky angles.

"Really? And what would a big, strapping lad like Moss want with... well.. you?" I let derision seep into my voice, and cringed as she recoiled bodily. Furious tears drew wet tracks through the paint on her face and the blades in her hands were trembling.

"I don't know, but he said he loved me and we'd make it out together."

I laughed and sneered to keep myself from trying to give her a hug. I reminded myself it would be a pointy one if I did.

"I mean, do you really think that he'd choose.. you... over Bella? She's so much more experienced, so much older, so much prettier..."

Her thin lips were pressed in a white, hard line, that soft chin went up in triumph.

"Well he _did_ choose me and I know he loved me because we-" She cut herself off, a blush creeping up under the paint, shifting back into her defensive pose.

I smirked as my heart broke for her. "And you think that means he loves you? He only used you to get in good with Ore and Brick. Bella probably saw right through him, but a silly little girl like yourself- ugly enough to be desperate, naïve enough to believe him, all he had to do was say some pretty words and you were his in. Face it- you're just a stupid, ugly little pig who thinks she's fallen in love."

There was a long pause, her eyes shut tight. When she opened them, they blazed with anger and promised vengeance.

She lunged towards me and I began to regret my plan.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Hi! I promise for the three of you reading this that it won't be another 2 months before I update again. I decided to go in a different direction that hopefully lends a little more depth to the Games. See you soon!**

**A big thanks to my beta readers, the fantastic Mother Crumpet, and the Ninth Wonder of the World, McJunker. who has vastly improved my writing and never led me astray****.**

**/purpleprose **


	13. Howl

Diamond rushed at me, her face a contorted mask, thin lips pulled back against her big, pale yellow teeth.

I steadied myself, gripping the knife that was slippery with sweat and blood and god knows what else. I heard something whistle by my ear and jerked far too late to dodge it if she hadn't missed.

What was she doing throwing her knives?

She still had her other blade, and she was in striking distance. Without thinking, I brought my left hand up instinctively and saw, rather than felt, the knife go through my hand. The nine-inch blade was stopped by the delicate scrolling hilt hitting my palm.

"Oh." I was momentarily transfixed by the metal suddenly sprouting from the back of my hand.

She faltered for a split second as well, letting go of the knife. I drove my right hand forward, intending to catch her in the neck and end it, but it still wasn't my dominant hand and it didn't have nearly the force or effect I intended. I tell myself that, at least; the alternative is I was too much of a coward to kill a little girl face-to-face, when I was fine letting one rip her own throat open on a wire trap I set.

I caught her to the right of the artery, leaving her with a long, red gash down the side of her neck and onto her chest. She seemed to refocus then, kneeing me in the groin and landing a vicious punch right over my liver. I was on the ground heaving before the next thought went through my head. The knife hit the dirt and twisted, its brass knuckle grip dragging my fingers along with it. Everything inside me had turned into a whirlpool of icy, greasy water and I could only stare at the insect corpses, leaf litter and crawling things near my face.

All I could think about was how I couldn't remember how to breathe. She sneered down at me and went to fetch the knife she'd thrown. It had landed in a web, and as she yanked it free with some difficulty, the spider silk began to vibrate with slow, sonorous waves that spread over the web and set the bird corpses to knocking together.

Diamond sauntered back over to me. I was just beginning to pick myself up, dead panic overriding pain. I dragged myself up bit by precious bit, trembling and sweating like a new-born fawn.

"This is how you die, Four."

I was finally up on my on hands and knees, and a swift kick in the ribs where she'd punched me before sent me right back to the sticky ground. I curled up into as much of a ball as I could, swallowing bile and sucking air in hitching gasps, tasting the fish Doe and I had shared. It felt like a lifetime ago. I just lay there, blinking and trying to force my body to obey me, failing utterly. I could barely manage a twitch.

"That was for Moss." She'd won. She knew it and I knew it. I only wanted a quick death, but she wasn't in the mood for anything approaching mercy.

In the corner of my eye, I saw the web was still swinging, forward and back, like it was alive. I shut my eyes tight and waited for her killing blow, and I hoped it wouldn't hurt too much. I wasn't actually sure how much more pain I could actually feel.

Diamond gave a tiny squeak and I looked up.

The stench I thought was me earlier had concentrated into a choking fog. Sitting on the web, was the largest, hairiest, ugliest spider I'd ever seen. Its ponderous, swollen abdomen seemed ready to burst at the slightest touch and silk spun lazily from the stinger that was poised to strike. I watched as one hairy, angular leg taptaptapped its way down to the ground, and then another. Its mandibles twitched as if it was feeding- closed, now flickering outward, closed again. The whole thing looked moist.

Diamond was frozen in place, staring at it. I saw the opportunity. I took it.

I ripped the stiletto from my hand and rammed it into the side of her knee.

She went down and I heard a sound I can't forget- the audible clicking and popping as her bending knee was annihilated by the knife scraping over and through cartilage and ligaments and lodging itself into bone. Her other leg thrashed and her hands hovered trembling over the immobilized joint, afraid to touch it, afraid not to.

I rolled over and over as fast as I could, trying to put distance between me and the spider- more importantly, more distance than Diamond. It was so slow, though.

I was crawling away on elbow and knees, and she was screaming. I turned, and I could see it tap one clawed leg on her bad one. I saw her turn pale, and she was still screaming. It had changed though, from surprise and pain to the hysterical wailing of a terrified child. "Mommy" and "Four" and "help".

Like Marcus when he woke up from a nightmare and thought he saw monsters in the closet or under my bed- choked sobs and screams that hurt my throat just listening to them. She was scuffling away, now, kicking with one heel, grabbing and pulling blindly with her hands, her wide eyes never leaving the thing in front of her.

The spider towered on crooked legs that seemed impossibly thin for all the bulk resting on them. The stinger was hovering over her, and I turned away, clawing my way to my feet and stumbling away, as fast as I could manage.

I stopped when I heard a sound that was halfway between a dropped watermelon splitting on asphalt and the squelch of mud as you pull your boot out, and I couldn't not look. It was only a few yards away.

She was impaled on the stinger, foaming and convulsing. It pulled her off in a way that still makes me retch and began to wrap her up, turning her over and over, her jerking limbs being swaddled and stilled by silk.

I limped away, picking up speed as the fists clenched in my insides released their grip, unintentionally keeping track of time. Five minutes, ten minutes...

I finally heard a cannon.

I let out a breath somewhere between a laugh and a sob.

I'd lost my weapon, and I'd lost Doe. We had agreed to meet up back at the lake, but there was no reason for her to abandon our Feast bag. She was in trouble and I didn't know where to begin to try and save her. I didn't want to think about the fact she might be dead- I reminded myself there'd been no cannonade aside from the massacre at the Feast and now Diamond's. Unless the one I thought was Moss was actually her...

It was only about midday, but I was numb and so, so tired.

I realized my hand needed attention when the leg of my pants was suddenly wet, but I couldn't really tie my shirt around it, stiff and filthy as it was. Looking closely, I realized it was less blood and more pus draining. I felt a little sick at the sight.

I pulled the garrote up higher and tightened it, hopefully enough to slow the blood and give it time to clot.

I wandered in something of a daze for most of the day, growing steadily hungrier, weaker. Going in no particular direction, the landscape was changing. The towering pines and redwoods were thinning and shrinking to twisted, stunted dwarfs; the sun was shining a little more harshly; dark, damp soil grew drier, sandier.

I was brown and black and dull red. Sweat and gore were plastering my shirt and pants to my skin, and in the deepening heat, the smell was making me a little dizzy. It was oppressive and heavy; each turn of my head, swing of my arms brought a fresh waft of Moss's stomach acid and contents, Mala's coppery blood, my own. There was no water to slake my growing thirst, or to wash up.

As I walked, I kept feeling the sensation in my hands, traveling up my arms of the knife ripping through tissue- his muscles resistant and rough, his organs sliced through clean as butter, the grit of her knee. I flexed them and rubbed them together, trying to get rid of it. I wondered if Diamond felt anything when she stabbed my hand. It still didn't hurt. The nails on the two numb, paralyzed fingers were turning slowly black and the skin had a faint green cast, puffy and pale, with threadlike veins winding their way up my wrist. The stab wound had closed, knit together with blood. Flexing my hand set it to leaking, though.

I walked into a tree and refocused my attention on my surroundings, chiding myself that there were still other tributes around. I'd been sweating less- what was fat, rolling drops was barely a sheen, even though it had only gotten hotter. I'd been around enough sailors who'd keeled over from heat exhaustion and stroked out to know I was dehydrating fairly quickly and if I didn't get water soon, I'd die from that before Bella and Ore ever found me.

I noticed the sound of water- not quite the roar of the waterfall, and I knew I was too lost to be back in that area so soon. I was on edge already and the thought crossed my mind that I'd snapped and was hallucinating. A little further on, though, I saw an unassuming creek and no one around. I dropped to my knees in front of it, about to plunge my hands and face in when I remembered Doe's story. I looked again. I'd thought I could see the pebbly bottom of rocks and stones and long, trailing riverweeds, but on closer look it was all a play of the light on the water. I couldn't actually see anything but fathomless water rushing by so fast it sounded like a roiling boil.

I got up and found deadfall some distance away, a mid-sized branch with swiftly browning leaves. It looked like there had been a struggle here, with deep gouges from something like an axe or a broadsword scarring a few trees and the soil and leaves churned up in piles and mini-drifts, furrows and ridges scoring the dirt.

I returned to the stream and dipped no more than a few inches of the branch in, holding on with both hands. Almost instantly, it was ripped away, whacking me on the shin as it went. It was like it had blinked out of existence.

It was Doe's strid.

I backed away like it was a viper, fear washing over me as I realized just how close I came to accidental suicide.

It wasn't that wide. A yard, no more- jumping it would be easy. But knowing what waited if I misjudged or slipped was screwing with my nerves and I couldn't bring myself to risk it. Besides, the only things on the other side were desert and a field. I didn't know anything about how to survive in the desert and chances were the field had been picked clean. It didn't seem worth it to risk so much.

No, at this point it was better to make my way back to the lake and pray that Doe had done the same.

From her story, following this would lead to the waterfall, and I could make my way down from there. The hardest part would just be leaving it the hell alone.

I turned to go back in the sparse shade of the trees and instead of taking another step, I found the ground rushing up to meet me. It took a moment to realize what had happened, and I went to stand up.

No dice.

I was stretched out on the soil, suddenly shaking like a leaf and I felt like crying and sicking up at the same time. I was more thirsty than I could ever remember being. Everything hurt. My feet were sore from walking, bruises were starting to appear. It was still ridiculously hard to breathe, like trying to fill my lungs through a straw. I wanted everything off of me, to just be clean again. I wanted to brush my goddamn teeth and wash my face and not be covered in the blood and guts of somebody's kid. I wanted to stop hearing Diamond screaming my name. I wanted my parents. I wanted to go fishing with my dad and watch my mom make sushi out of our catch. I wanted to play catch with Marcus and tease June about staying out too late with Parker. I wanted to see Lina. I wanted to kiss her and I wanted to make her blush the way she did. I wanted to go home and I wasn't ever going to. I wanted water, and it was sitting right in front of me, promising to drown me if I so much as touched it.

I stared up at the dome of the Arena, watching what looked for all the world like a real sky. I don't know for how long, maybe an hour, maybe two. The thought came that I should just end it- just stop fighting and jump in and be done with everything when something... I don't know. Clicked or snapped or stopped or something. I just suddenly knew that I could get up if I wanted to. And I wanted to.

I rolled over, braced myself. Hands and knees, and I was on my feet again, heading for the lake and hopefully Doe.

I stepped on something, thinking it was a stray branch. I heard the whipping sound and hit the ground, more from instinct than actual thought. I watched as the tree in front of me suddenly had an arrow sticking out of it, and tried to crawl out of the line of fire. I got maybe a foot away, and my own jerked behind me. What I thought was a root was a snare, crude but effective. I twisted and spun, cursing all the while, but it was no use. If I had my knife this would be cake, but I didn't, and it wasn't. I realized that the more I struggled against it, the more it tightened. Fighting the urge to try and break it through strength, I hunched over it, working at the strap until it was loose enough to slip my foot out of my boot. I was working the boot free from the loop when I heard rustling behind me and looked up to see Erica, who was leveling an arrow right between my eyes.

**AN: Them spiders, man. *shudders***

**So it's a year today that I first started posting this story. Thank you all so much for reading and reviewing. It's been a long road (though a chapter a month isn't so bad!), but there's still miles to go before Annek's tale is told, and I hope you'll stick with me. **

**Super big thanks to McJunker, who beta'd this in less than 10 hours because he's just that awesome. Read his stuff, yo. **


	14. Risk Reward

Erica had the arrow leveled at my eyes, and I froze like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

The irony of the fact that I had survived in spite of everything that had happened, only to walk straight into the most obvious trap ever hit me hard. My mouth quirked up, and once I started laughing I couldn't stop, lying on the ground and waiting for the end, trying to catch my breath.

When my fit passed and I was lying there, half-giddy and half-mortified, Erica was staring at me like I was crazy. Maybe I was. I turned so I faced her, ready to die. Her arrow wavered, and a long moment passed.

"Aren't you going to kill me?" I said, more to fill the silence than anything else. If she was going to, she should just get on with it instead of waiting for me to decide I really, really wanted to live and start crying or begging. I was fifty-fifty now, and I could feel my hands starting to shake. I clenched them in the dirt. I sat up so I was kneeling, brushing dirt and dead leaves out of my hair with my right hand. I could at least die with a little dignity.

"Why were you laughing?" she hissed, eyes flickering, as if she expected a trap. She'd taken a step back as I sat up, but the arrow had dropped from between my eyes to my heart. I wasn't sure if that was good or bad.

"Because of how utterly stupid this is. I survive for three fucking days now, and I end up like this? I killed a goddamn mermaid. " I said, getting irritated. "Kill me or don't, I don't care, just stop... this." I waved my arm, meaning the position she had me in.

Erica faltered. She swallowed hard as she resettled her stance, gripping the bow and re-notching the arrow, buying time. It struck me, from the way she took a deep breath and wouldn't meet my eyes, that she hadn't killed anyone yet. I'd be her first.

"It's all right," I found myself trying to comfort her. "You do livestock in Ten, yeah? Just think of me as a cow or something."

"Shut up— Just shut up," she spat, and the arrow slipped out of readiness.

"You have to do it. Either that, or let me go." Fifty-one- forty-nine, on the side of living.

"You'd kill me." That, at least was certain for her.

"I wouldn't. I'd go the opposite direction and never look back." I would, too. She seemed nice enough in the weeks leading up to the Game, keeping to her now-dead District mate.

"You're covered in... whatever that is," She said, incredulous. I didn't have an answer, so I dropped my eyes from her face and kept silent.

The moment stretched on, and I ventured a proper look at her. She was filthy, with slightly sunken cheeks, and her short, spiky black hair was matted. It looked like it had been a rough few days for her. She was definitely thinner from before the Games.

"You must be thirsty," I ventured, changing tack. Her lips were more chapped than mine were. "I can get you some water."

"Where? You don't have anything." Her eyes flickered across me, but she was too eager, and I pressed on.

"The strid," I said simply. "The thing that looks like a creek over there." I pointed in the general direction.

"I can get that myself." Erica's voice went hard, disappoint coloring her response.

"No, you can't. You'll kill yourself trying to drink from it." I didn't know why I was telling her this. It would be pretty perfect to lead her over and shove her in. Probably instantaneous as well.

"Prove it." She was wary, and gestured with the bow. "Get up."

I paused, struck that she was giving me a chance. She must not have met anyone else. As glad as I was she was making it, it was a mistake.

I finished untying the snare around my leg (which had tightened again in my laughing fit) and shoved my boot back on. I stood up slowly, not wanting to spook her, and walked back to where the strid burbled along.

The place where I came across it seemed good enough, with a few yards of clear space. I picked up another branch and walked over to the strid, keeping eye contact with Erica all the while.

I dropped the branch in, and ducked when Erica flinched and let the arrow go out of shock. It whistled by, where my shoulder would have been. She gave a little shriek when she realized what she had done and dropped the bow.

I stood still, waiting for her to compose herself. She flushed red and picked up the bow quickly, but didn't notch another arrow. She practically dared me to comment on it, but I at least had enough sense to keep quiet.

"Do you have anything to dig with?" I asked, hopeful.

"Nothing I'd give to you." Erica wasn't completely naïve.

I sighed, expecting that, and hunted around for a short, thick stick. After a while, Erica kicked one over to me and I settled in to digging a good few yards away from the strid. Erica watched, and didn't move to help.

Loop after loop, arc after arc, and I got closer to the water. It took about an hour before I reached the bank, tentatively pushing the last bit of mud into the current. As I did, water rushed in, slopping over the sides of the channel I'd dug. The winding, circuitous ditch slowed it down, until there was a few inches of cool water ambling by where I'd begun. I cupped a little in my right hand. It tasted mostly like mud, but I was too thirsty to care. I drank and drank until my belly was full and heavy.

I scooted over to the side to try and wash some of the grime off of me, and I waited until she was eagerly sucking down water to ask, "Allies?"

She froze and I waited, occupying myself with washing my left arm, checking on the wound. It was, unsurprisingly, still gross and seeping blood. My third finger was numb and immobile, now, in addition to the ring and the pinky. It seemed to be spreading faster now that Diamond had shoved a knife through it.

"All- all right," she agreed, stealing a tentative glance over. "What do you have with you?"

I paused for a moment.

"My charm?"

It was a weak answer, and I knew it. I was making it harder for her to justify allying with me just so she didn't have to kill me. "And- and I can get us water, obviously. And there's a lake the direction I was heading that's full of fish. I can fish."

"And your District-mate?" Her voice was wary, suspecting an ambush.

"I don't know. We were supposed to meet up after the Feast, and I found the bag, but it was near... near a giant spider and I haven't seen her," I said, mumbling through the last bit. I should at least try not to make it sound like I murdered Doe.

"Why don't you have the bag, then?"

"Like I said- giant spiders." I was sharper than I wanted to be, and I grimaced. "I was just trying not to die at that point, so..." I trailed off, and Erica nodded.

We drank our fill a few times over, filled the water bottle Erica had, and then set off for the lake. We were still walking, taking it slowly to preserve our energy and keep careful watch for the Pack as the sun went down.

We hadn't talked much, because voices carried, but I'd learned she'd never taken Tesserae either. Her family had quite a few cows, and the occasional chicken. Her Ward in District Ten gave a huge dinner the day before their Reaping. She was an only child. Never knew any Tributes personally. Assumed all the Districts higher than Five trained for the Games.

I found myself whispering to her, then, about Marcus and June. I told her the story about the first time I took Marcus out in a kayak. How June and I thought we'd lost him once, and died a thousand times before finding him asleep in our parents' bed. How June covered for me when I snuck out after curfew to meet up with you guys. How I covered for her when she stayed out with Parker the entire night and teased her mercilessly when she nodded off into her cereal the next morning.

We heard Panem's Anthem, and looked up for the day's tally. Nan and Ulrich from Five were dead. Mala, from Twelve. Moss, from Seven. Diamond from One. Brick, surprisingly, from Two.

A flourish. "Congratulations to District Four for both Tributes making it to the Fantastic Five. Your prizes are on their way. Remember, Tributes, if you need something, let your Sponsors know! We're just itching to level the playing field."

Another flourish, and it faded away.

Doe was somehow still alive, and Erica was on edge, sneaking a slightly jealous glance my way. I didn't know how to feel, for the first time. Things just weren't adding up. Don't get me wrong, I didn't want her to die, but there was no reason she should be alive longer than, say, Brick. But Bella and Ore were holding up as the Pack. It struck me that there were so very few of us left alive. This was almost over.

We paused, waiting for the silky parachute to make its way down, spiraling slowly in the dusk. It was a full, heavy backpack. Good, hot food; fruit and carrots and mashed potatoes and beef brisket. A whole two gallons of water and smaller water bottles to put it in.

Not a weapon to be seen.

We counted our blessings, and ate.

Later that night, I took first watch, propped up against a tree and watching for Bella and Ore to approach in the dark. About an hour before Erica and I switched, two tiny tubes fluttered down in the dark, landing in my lap. My heart was in my throat and I fumbled with the cap, unscrewing it. It was a note addressed to Erica.

_Dear Erica, _

_Fortune favors those who do for themselves. _

_If you would like your choice of weapons and food for the duration of the Games, please kill Annek by sundown. _

_The Gamemakers_

Mine was the same, promising medicine for my arm as well. I stuffed the notes back in their tubes, wrapping their parachutes around them. Assuming everyone got these to shake up the last few days, Bella and Ore would be pitted against each other. But Doe? She'd be doubled up on someone. Would they be cruel enough to pit her against Ore or Bella? Erica would be the fairest fight for her.

I looked over to watch her. She seemed like she was asleep, huddled under the crinkly, metallic emergency blanket she'd scavenged. Her chest rose and fell evenly, and her face was relaxed. I got up as quietly as I could, keeping low to the ground, watching for dry leaves and twigs. My fingers found the garrotte tied around my left arm, feeling that it was still there.

I reached the strid and dropped them in, careful not to let my fingers touch the water.

I made my way back over to camp and cracked open the backpack full of food, munching absentmindedly and going over my options, keeping an eye out for any figures moving in the dark.

Erica saved my life. I couldn't kill her, could I?

I went around and around on the subject, until it was time to switch, and I shook her gently.

"Wake up, your shift."

She jerked awake, apparently not that soundly asleep. I pushed her bow and arrows towards her and backed away, once I saw that she was alert, blinking in the darkness, and I took a place underneath another tree, settling in to sleep until morning.

I shook my head when she asked if anything happened.

"It's almost been boring." I knocked on the tree I was huddled against, and she gave me a wan smile.

I was more tired than I thought I was, and nodded off without meaning to.

I dreamt I felt something burning me, falling on my face and shoulders and legs, and awoke to realize that something was. Erica was tugging at my arm, calling my name, and I stumbled up, feeling sick and reeling from being dragged so suddenly from sleep. She shouted something at me and I grabbed the pack of food and followed her into the clearing near the strid, but we couldn't stay there. We ripped the blanket (more like a sheet of plastic than anything) and held it above our heads, running for the beach at a dead sprint, fast as we could go.

Trees were turning to acid and cinders, crumbling and melting and pooling in the gusty wind, and smoke was everywhere, thick and choking.

The forest was melting around us.

* * *

><p>Once again, thanks to McJunker for being an awesome beta!<p> 


	15. A King Crowned

Erica and I ran for our lives, a dead sprint careening through the forest, dodging bubbling, hissing pools of acid and ash and solidified, cracking drops of tree trunks.

I was exhausted. Pure, jagged, life-or-death adrenaline on sleep-sick nerves is hell, and as it bled away, I was flagging. Erica was slowing as well, seeing as three days without food and then a full, heavy meal seemed to do more harm than actual good. But it was run or die, so we ran.

Finally, the trees started thinning out, and we were reaching a part where the forest had already melted and burned to stunted, charred stubs of slag leaning out of the smoke and fog. We slowed to a walk. Even if we weren't, it felt as if we were the last two people anywhere at all, and as if the ghosts of all the Tributes who'd died were slinking around, lurking behind trees or staring at the back of your neck. I could swear that I could see Moss looming, and it would turn out to be a trick of the light, or the remains of a tree. Mala, Caelan, all the others... I kept getting glimpses of them, whispering _Annek_ and _Erica_, then_ Doe_ and_ Bella_ and _Ore_ as well. The hair I had left was standing straight up, and neither of us dared to talk. The ragged breaths we were sucking in seemed too loud, even as we tried to quiet them. We stuck close together, our arms almost touching. Every so often a tree would break and fall, tearing at the silence before a thump that would make the ground beneath us tremble.

And then I saw them.

I thought they were ghosts made flesh, to be honest. I froze where I was, putting my arm out to keep Erica from moving ahead, and felt her grab it out of fear, finding my hand with her own. It was surprisingly reassuring, and I squeezed back. Because standing not twenty feet away, barely visible, were Bella and Doe, facing away from us, wandering themselves. I hadn't heard a cannon, and Erica hadn't either, so where was Ore?

I hadn't seen Bella since before the Games began. She still had her trademark, fiery red ponytail. You know that long hair in the Arena is just a good handle for someone to grab you by. She'd bragged to Caesar during her interview that she wouldn't bother cutting it because she was so sure she'd win. It was a little more ratty now, but the whole three feet of it was still swinging behind her. Ore was nowhere to be found. He and Bella must have been pitted against each other. Doe... Doe had a few bruises, on her face and neck, and it took Erica desperately clutching my arm to keep me from launching myself at Bella for putting them there. Doe didn't look scared, though. Tired, and a little more ragged around the edges, but there was a determination in her eyes that gave me hope.

I looked at Erica, who was watching me. I ever so slowly mimicked notching an arrow at Bella, and she nodded.

She pulled away from me, slipping her bow from its sling and an arrow from the quiver, taking her time and notching it. Her hands were shaking, though, and the arrow skipped off the scabbard slung on Bella's back, sticking into her side. Bella yelped, grabbing at the arrow. She didn't bother examining the wound or assessing the damage; just pulled her ponytail to the side, drew her sword and ran at us, the direction of the arrow. All the Careers did that. I think half their training must have been to attack as soon as they've been attacked. Erica ran to one side, and I ran towards Doe.

"Annek!" Doe was calling my name, and she sounded so happy. I reached her, unable to stop myself from giving her a quick hug out of relief.

"Oh, Doe, I'm glad you're okay."

I don't... I don't remember if she returned it.

"Weapon?" It was rushed, as I turned to look for Erica. She was still trying to outrun Bella, disappearing in and out of the smoke. If Bella caught her, it was all over. No weapon was forthcoming, and I turned back to Doe.

"Weapon? Come on, there's no time," I said, giving her a little shake.

Doe was staring at me, an odd look twisting her features. At first, I couldn't tell, from the fog swirling around us, what exactly the look was on her face. It was so familiar, but I couldn't place it for a long moment, staring into her eyes as she did into mine. And then it hit me.

Erica had that look when she first saw me.

Doe was trying to screw up the courage to kill me.

I pitched myself backwards as Doe threw herself towards me, teeth bared. I fell, landing on a hard, acrid puddle of tree, feeling the back of my shirt begin to dissolve. I rolled to the side, just as the knife that I had lost when I fought Diamond- brass knuckles, triangular blade, and all- came crashing down into my face.

It didn't hurt. At first, I thought she'd punched me. I only realized she actually stabbed me when I could feel the blade in my mouth with my tongue, cold and then warm and coppery. I couldn't focus on that. Taking a note from Mags, I lashed out with a punch and it caught her on the side of her head, I think. She went down and I scrambled up, feeling the acid on the ground start to eat through my palms. I ripped out the knife before it could start to hurt, and I pinned her where she'd fallen, ignoring her whimpering from the acid or my weight. I can't... quite remember what happened next. I tried to speak and I couldn't. I tried to swallow instead.

She tried to say something, and I didn't let her finish. I was so angry. She was my District-mate. This wasn't how it was supposed to happen. We fought together, or we never saw each other again. That's how it happened in every other Game. We do not kill our own. I was just so angry that she would try to fucking kill me when all I was trying to do was protect her while I could. I couldn't move, I was so angry. My hand tightened on the knife and I heard a thunk, and it was in her chest, and I couldn't tell whose blood was whose.

I hadn't meant to. I really didn't. I didn't mean to. I pulled it out, but that just made it worse. There was so much blood and teeth were everywhere, and she looked so small and so scared. I tried to stop her from bleeding but there wasn't any hope at all and I just held her hand. She clutched it with both of hers. I tried to say I was sorry, but it didn't come out right.

The last thing she said was, "I want my daddy. " And then her cannon went off and I heard someone screaming and then I couldn't hear anything at all and my face was on fire and I couldn't think.

-ReR-

I don't remember much for a while after that. I can see flashes of things. I remember seeing Erica and Bella dead on the ground. Bella had an arrow in her eye and Erica was almost in half. I didn't see her face and I was glad of that. I remember yanking on Bella's ponytail, and cutting it off. Pretty much only because they kept showing that in the highlights.

I don't know. I just walked, holding my face when I could stand to touch it. I walked until I didn't and then I sat down. I closed my eyes. I opened them, and it was bright day.

-ReR-

I almost couldn't move because of the pain everywhere. My back, my face. My hands. My whole left arm was weak and gray and tingling, like someone was squeezing it with barbed wire.

I just lay there for a while trying to breathe through it all. There was a bottle in a parachute a few yards away, and I crawled over, inch by murderous inch. It took what felt like hours. I fumbled the cap off without stopping to read the label, assuming it was water. I drank as much as I could, most of the liquid just slopping through the holes in my face. It was cloyingly sweet, and burned like alcohol. It was PainAway, and for a moment I was terrified because I'd overdosed myself. You only need a few sips and I'd tried to drink an entire bottle. I spat out what I could, but it was too late.

It was the worst pain in the world. Everything I'd been feeling up til then was nothing, consumed in the burning, chemical sear from my head to my fingertips to my toes. My heart hurt, and all I could smell were rotting lemons. Until, finally, it faded away, and there wasn't anything at all. My whole body was numb.

I touched my face. Couldn't feel it.

Touched my leg. Couldn't feel it.

I stood up. I almost lost my balance, tilting forward and half-running, half-falling down the scree pile. I was working on instinct and sight, because I couldn't feel where my feet were.

I went sprawling at the very end, sliding on the gravel. I picked myself up once I wasn't so dizzy. Still didn't feel a thing, though I was probably a mess. I started to walk over to the water, and then remembered the mermaids, and decided against that.

I just sort of stared around, unsure of where to go or what to do.

"I was wondering when you'd show up. I've been waiting here for you for over a day."

I'd only heard that voice in the Arena at the Cornucopia. It was still as loud and obnoxious.

"Ore," I said, trying to be confident, challenging, and bold. Only it came out "Oh," garbled and whisper-quiet.

"I think this will be the easiest final fight in the history of the Games. You're half-dead already. It's almost not even fair."

He took a step forward, from where I just hadn't seen him standing, watching me. I startled, taking a step back, just barely correcting in time to avoid falling. He laughed. He was heavier than me, all muscle and health. He was a few inches taller. Not enough to cause problems like Moss. Just enough to give him an advantage. He looked like he'd just stepped off his platform, however long ago it was. Not a scratch besides some dirt under his nails.

He was so close. He took a step forward, turning it into a kick that landed with a solid, audible crack and left me gasping in the breakwater of the lake. Delicate little waves crashed against me, turning brown and red. It didn't hurt. I just couldn't breathe right, and there was a dent in my chest where the kick landed. I tried to pick myself up, but he was on me again, landing blows that made my sight explode into stars without actually hurting at all. I tried to get my bearings, but all I could think was I was going to die, and it wasn't going to hurt at all, because someone gave me PainAway and I drank the lot of it, because I was either incredibly smart or incredibly stupid. It was all I could do to shove a hand up into his face. He spluttered a bit, and stood up to walk it off.

"Panem!" He was shouting now. I could hear him walking, turning to look for all the cameras that were watching him kill me.

"How should I kill Four? Huh? Tell me," he roared, into thin air, to the whole world. "Tell me how you want your Victor crowned!"

"Just with my bare hands?" He gave them a taste, dragging me back from where I was picking myself up and landing a punch on the dent in my chest, leaving me to heave up blood and try not to choke on it, or drown in the wavelets washing across my face. My eyesight would go blurry each time one did.

"No? Tell me!"

Scrolls were falling like snow. He read a few out to me. Beat me. Stab me. Scalp me for Bella. Disembowel me for Diamond. Kiss me, from some demented idiot. He read out probably fifty, each worse than the last, reveling in his victory. I just lay there.

But I finally had an idea, and I started crawling further out into the lake. A few of the waves knocked me off my hands and knees, and I could hear the mermaids singing. They were so close now that I reached out an unthinking hand before the wave receded. I stood up, half-floating, then walked out further into lake.

"Annek Alda," Ore read off a scroll, tripping over my name. "I'm going to kill you now. You can't run away from me." He cast the paper over his shoulder, staring me down as he waded out to where I was waist-deep. I was counting on the fact that Ore Magnussen couldn't hold his breath and couldn't swim.

He whispered hoarsely, plenty loud enough to be picked up by the cameras, playing it up for the audience, even as he slowed down, feeling for his footing, flailing his arms in the water like a toddler. "I'm keeping it a secret how, though." I was about chest-deep, now. I looked down, unwrapping the garrote from my arm, tying it to my wrist and wrapping my other hand around the handle. I waited. If he was going to kill me, he'd kill me. But I was damned if the last thing my family saw was him gloating over me. They would see me fighting.

I looked past his shoulder, widening my eyes as far as they would go, grunting something unintelligible and taking a step back. He bought it for a single second, freezing to the spot, his shoulders hunched. He relaxed, though, and smirked, turning indulgently around.

"Nice try, Four."

I launched myself at him, getting the garrote around his neck and wrapping my legs around his waist as we fell towards the shore. We plunged into the water, sinking to the gravelly bottom, his arms waving wildly.

He struggled as much as I did, tearing at my hair and face and hands, trying to kick against me, against the sand at the bottom, connecting with a circling mermaid who flashed away for a second. Everything around us was foam and blood, mostly mine. He was weakening, as was I, pulling on the cord as hard as I could. But I held tight, hoping she'd go for him and not me, even though my injuries were what was drawing her closer. She bumped us, testing our edibility. I saw something black and white rake along my whole side and then across him, dragging us further away from shore with terrifying speed. I saw him stiffen and spasm, his head bashing against mine and making me go blind for a brief moment. My mind told me my lungs should be burning, and I let him go, kicking off of him, clawing for the silvery surface. My vision was dimming, but I couldn't feel any burning in my lungs. My right eye was still blind, and as I took in a gasp of mostly water, my face barely breaking the surface, I heard a cannon. I thought it was mine.

I coughed, but I was sinking, and my lungs felt so incredibly heavy, acid tendrils of pain at last slithering over and through me. I slipped underwater, watching the lake close over me. I was so tired.

I was dying. I was okay with that.

-ReR-

I woke up in a hospital bed without any idea of what day it was, where I was, or who I was, until Meghan was hugging me and crying, and kissing my forehead and my cheeks and once full on my lips, telling me I was such an idiot but she was so happy. I just sat there and let her. I couldn't focus on much of anything. I just kept flashing back to Doe, lying on the ground, crying and holding my hand with both of hers.

I could see out of both eyes again. My left arm was stronger than my right again, a healthy pink and tan. I could take a deep breath again, my lungs feeling wonderfully light and big. The only things wrong with me were the angry scars on my face and body. Meghan told me that the medics didn't want to erase all of them completely, because they gave me character. I felt the new teeth in my mouth, and the scar on my left cheek. I shuddered.

The last thing was the Victory Presentation.

I rode alone on the chariot and in a costume similar to the one Meghan had made for me at the beginning of the Games. There was a lot more gold this time. There was an expansive straightaway that I rode up, my horses frothing and prancing before they stood stock still in front of the expansive, ornate stage where I would be crowned. I dismounted, and rose on a platform to where President Snow was waiting with a deep green, waxy crown of laurel leaves. I knelt before him, and someone pulled off the golden coral crown I wore. He placed the laurel crown on my head and pulled me up, raising my arm as we turned to face the completely silent crowds. It's tradition to be quiet, until after Caesar announces the Victor properly.

"Congratulations, Annek Alda," said President Snow. His lips barely moved.

"Thank you." I whispered it back, and only his hand tightening on my wrist let me know he heard it.

Caesar's voice boomed over the speakers, the vibrations shaking me to my core.

"Ladies and gentleman, we proudly present Annek Alda, the fifty-ninth Victor of the Hunger Games!"

The crowd exploded in cheers, and I didn't feel anything at all.


	16. A Violet in the Youth of Primy Nature

It was that time before dawn when the world turns slate gray, faintly illuminated without light. The sand had long since gone cold, but the breeze was still warm. The bottle was now empty, owing to Annek, who had shifted some time during the night to rest on Julia's lap. Once he finished, he drifted into silence, half-dozing, half lost in memory.

Julia was wide awake, half-sitting, half-lying against a comfortable pile of sand, one hand tracing soothing, intricate patterns across his collarbones. It was a lot to take in, and she was matching up dates and her perception of things in her head. Emotions were swirling around and she didn't quite know what to make of them. Anger at the Capitol. Grief for Doe, sharp and fresh still. Mostly, however, she felt for Annek, and what he'd been through, all alone.

The feelings of years ago- the girlish crush turned hard fall into infatuation, crushing pain when she saw Lina on his arm, despair and withdrawal, slow recovery and resignation (none of which she'd ever let him see): they had all blossomed again. It was an ember that scared her with how fast it had sparked back to life, like it was never anything less than a glowing red center and high yellow flame. It had only been a night, but something about it seemed so real; a rare, years-long bond sealed in just a few hours. She realized with a rueful, private smile that in this moment, bleary-eyed and sleep-deprived, she was as happy and content as she'd ever been. She cradled his head, running fingers through his salt-rough hair. It was getting lighter and lighter around her: every time she looked up, she could see a few more feet out to sea before it was swallowed by the ancient dark. The night was old, now, and it was etching away at her. As comfortable as it was, it was time to leave.

"We should go inside."

"Nngh." He mumbled something incoherent and turned over, burying his face in her lap, sending a shiver up her spine.

"Annek..." She shook him gently. "Annek, come on. Let's get you inside."

He stirred, becoming a bit more lucid, and they staggered up. She slung his arm over her shoulders and guided him into the house, catching him when he stepped on his own foot. They made it up the winding staircase to his room, where she propped him against a wall, pulled back the sheets, then steered him into bed and tucked him in.

She hesitated for a moment, then cleared the hair from his brow, letting her fingers and her eyes linger on his face, tracing the strong, square jaw, the aquiline nose, the high cheekbones. The bags under his eyes that she didn't think were there before. The jagged, thread-thin scar curving up his left cheek that pulled the mouth into a subtle, but permanent smirk. She remembered herself, and Doe, and drew away.

A drowsy hand caught her wrist and pulled, gentle but insistent, and a thrill ran through her.

"Stay."

She froze. "What?"

"Stay, please."

"I don't think that's a good idea." Her heart was racing, but from what she wasn't sure.

"None, none of this was a good idea. Please stay. I don't wanna be alone." It was somewhere between a whine and a plea, and he was slurring badly, but she could make it out. He pulled her into bed, and she stopped resisting.

A minimum of shuffling, and she was nestled in thick covers and his arms, his warm scent of sandalwood and amber in her nose. She didn't even mind the whiskey that clung to him. It dawned on her that this was the only place she belonged; the only place she ever would.

She rested her head on his arm and curled into him, closing her eyes and letting her fingers glide languorously over his side, feeling the sandy cotton fabric of his shirt and the hard muscles underneath, letting her legs intertwine with his. Her heart beat just that much faster when his free hand came to rest on the small of her back, broad, warm, and comforting.

She felt like a rock that had been tossed into a pond and had just finished its slow, tumbling descent into the silt at the bottom, finally at quiet rest.

Soon, though, the scene from what felt like ages before played in her mind. Annek rustling through cabinets, June watching him with pained, angry helplessness. Slamming cabinets, pointing fingers. The dishtowel landing at his feet, June sweeping out of the room. Did June think she was hanging around because he was a Victor? A shock rippled through her, and she was suddenly wide awake, burning with embarrassment. She checked the clock on the bedside table. 0510. How would it look if she came down in last night's clothes from his room? She and June had just reconnected; she didn't want to ruin things with a misunderstanding.

She fretted about it a bit longer, and her decision was made. She would do this the right way, or not at all. For appearances' sake, she'd come back later in the day. Dragging herself up and out of the bed took all the rest of her strength, fighting against fatigue, and the new-found sense of longing that begged her to stay right beside him. Annek stirred, mumbling something that sounded a bit like "where gone", his fingers softly grasping at trailing limbs.

She whispered her plan in his ear, and, after a short pause in which her heart and time itself stopped, kissed him gently. Her heart soared when he returned it, his lips playing against hers, a drowsy hand rising to cradle the curve of her jaw. She was light as air, girlishly giddy as years of longing, unrequited yearning were finally revealed, recognized, wanted, returned.

She was all in.

~ReR~

Annek heard the door close, but didn't realize what it meant until long after Julia was gone. When it finally registered that he was alone, fear and shame and guilt were there, like they always were. Pinpricks and flashes of memories he'd much rather forget, old hurts he had just wrenched open, they all played in a frenetic, sickening loop, slipping over and piling up one on another.

He was overcome, shivers and tremors of stashed-away pain breaking through his deliberate but too-thin fog. He willed himself to be insensate, to just fall asleep, but he was roiling, and there was no use.

He half-rolled, half- fell out of bed and crawled to a suitcase. Inefficient fingers dove deep under crumpled clothes to a small bag. He fumbled with it, growing more and more frantic by the minute, until he ripped it open, jamming the zipper, and pulled out one of many syringes. It was unobtrusive, tiny, really; only two inches in length and half as wide. A metal plate was on the end opposite the plunger, concealing hundreds of microscopic needles. He clutched it like a talisman. Some insistent, small voice prompted him to shove the bag back underneath the clothes, and crawl back into bed. There, he pressed the cold metal to the crook of his arm, right above the deadened patch of skin where the small black bar lurked. He squeezed the plunger down. The scratching sensation of sandpaper dragging across his skin, and an ice cold spreading quickly up his arm, still unnerving after all this time. And then...

It was exquisite, nearly unbearable. His muscles worked; back arching and twisting slowly in the darkness, mouth gasping, eyes rolling, hands clenching, chest heaving.

He was floating in a space of complete and utter exhaustion, emotional and physical. It was a curious, chemical sort of heaven: drunken nerves buzzing softly, morphling providing a thick and heavy haze, like full-fat cream drowning sugar. It was too good to move; too good, almost, to breathe. He drifted off in the shadow of a towering, blank white wall of rippling, scintillating pleasure.

~ReR~

He woke up to his body rebelling. He tumbled out of bed, crawling for the toilet, where he heaved up everything from last night. It was acrid, burning his throat and nose, and pain lanced through his paper- thin lids as the lights clicked on with the motion sensor.

His stomach flip-flopped, volatile. He cursed feebly and laid his face against the cool ceramic tiles. The pleasant buzzing of nerves had turned into an unsteady, sickly tremor down to his marrow. His head was throbbing, like his brain was too big for his skull and would burst any moment. His heart was fluttering wildly, pounding hard enough to hear the keen of blood in his ears one moment, so slowly the next he was afraid it would stop altogether. He was coated in a cold sweat. He lay there for a while, bemoaning his fate, and then tried for the comforting blackness of the room and the soft embrace of the bed. He made it up to his hands and knees, and then was back at the toilet, retching until there was nothing but bile, resting his forehead on the lip of the toilet seat.

A small hand rubbed his back, steadying him, while another held his hair away from the bowl.

"Rough night?" A voice purred.

He groaned in response.

"Oh, ew, Annek, don't put your head there! Come on."

Julia, spritely as ever and no worse for the wear, helped him into bed, returning to the bath for a cool, wet cloth.

"Do you remember what happened?" She asked, her voice quiet and light.

"I made probably the single worst decision of my life." Mumbling into the pillow, he didn't see the color drain from her face. So this was why alcohol and opioids didn't mix.

"And what was that?" An edge crept in.

"Drinking that whole bottle. Why didn't you stop me? I could have died, you know. How would you have lived with yourself?" Even on the comedown, he was lucid enough not to mention the morphling.

He heard Julia release a breath. "Well, you didn't and now you know not to. See? Everyone's happy," she said, sounding the tiniest bit relieved.

"Right," Annek mumbled, unconvinced. "Can you get me an anemetic and a painkiller?"

"From where?"

"The console over there. Codes 34312 and 61841." He flopped a hand in the general direction.

"Annek, there's no console over there. Just a window," Julia said, confused.

He pulled himself up painfully, exasperated, and his voice was sharp-edged. "Jules, it's right over –- ...I am not at the Tower." He cursed.

"Jesus, Annek, how often are you hungover?" She was incredulous, and a bit stung.

"Usually never, thanks to miracles of modern medicine."

Julia scoffed. "I'll go see if I can find you some," she called as she left the room.

Annek sank back down, mentally kicking himself for getting carried away, especially without an easy exit. There wasn't much he could do besides wallow in self-pity for his choices and think. He realised with a start that he was supposed to be at the Question and Answer Session at three that afternoon, the whole point of his trip home. He didn't dare look at the clock, but eventually he found that noon was still an hour away. Initial frenzy worn off, a reluctance to do anything but spend time with Julia overtook him. It was a weight lifted, it was hope, to have her know, and in spite of knowing, to be there for him in the morning. He wanted to drink it in for as long as he could before he returned to the City. Even with the hangover and the comedown, he felt himself wishing she was beside him, his arm wrapped around the inviting curves of her waist. A sense memory came to him, of her soft and warm and willing beside him, of the simple human heat of her.

Her scent of gardenia and coconut lingered. He wasn't altogether too sure what had happened, or when, but sometime during the long night, snippets and scraps of feelings and experiences had knit themselves into something burning warm and bright for her. Maybe he had always felt that way about her. Maybe he was lonely, and she was there. Maybe it was nice to be himself as he was, without the careful masks of the Capitol, or for his family. Maybe he was still a little drunk. He decided he was besotted for all the right reasons and none of the wrong ones. He drifted, reveling in the newness of it all.

When she returned with pills that rivaled those in the Capitol, (one a pink oval, the other a purple and blue capsule) and a glass of water, he swallowed them eagerly. He pulled her into bed, resting his head on her stomach and tossing an arm over her, like a pillow.

"You are my angel." He snuggled in, and she giggled. They took effect almost immediately. Within half an hour he felt solid again; hale.

It was so nice to be close to someone again, someone he wouldn't have to perform for.

This girl beneath him was the closest he could come to never having competed in the Games, and he held her close, marveling at the silkiness of her skin.

"I don't wanna do anything today," he whined, but there wasn't any heart in it, half-muffled as it was, spoken into her shirt.

"What do you have to do, anyway? Aren't you on vacation? Or you have that conference thing?" Even her voice was reassuring; low and husky, musical. If she were Capitol-born, she'd be a lounge singer, he thought, one of the best.

He was swiftly talking himself out attending the Q and A. No one really seemed to care (least of all him), and it was a dreary business. He hadn't actually met up with Meghan to plan it, he remembered, so it wasn't like it would be a world-ending tragedy if he bailed. And then he could spend the day with Julia.

"Nothing really. Yourself?" It was settled, and his fate was sealed.

"Well, I would have been at the market, but I missed the fish this morning, so I'm free."

They eventually made plans to meet up in about an hour to spend the day in the great outdoors. She was off, with an affectionate squeeze from a hand he hadn't remembered holding. He rolled out of bed to get dressed.

Looking for his other shoe, he stepped on the little glass tube from last night, shifting his weight just in time to avoid shattering it. He picked it up and rolled it in his palm, examining it. A little of the opaque liquid was clinging to the very bottom of the plunger; a few metallic silver droplets, looking appealingly poisonous. He pressed it to his arm without thinking, but paused.

He had been weak, last night. That was all. He deserved it, for once. He wasn't one of those pathetic Victors who drowned their problems in booze and morphling. He wouldn't be. He was just in a slump, and it wouldn't take long for him to feel better, once he got things sorted here. It was just a temporary indulgence that he'd earned.

He dropped the emptied syringe into the disheveled suitcase and went out into day.


	17. Ghosts I have Loved

The ring was perfect. A small oval of frosty white seaglass, fluted and set in a sea of sweet blue gemstones, ranging from snowy to stormy to almost black, with swirling filigrees of silver wrapping delicately around the stones and her finger. It caught the setting sun and flickered, throwing off bright shards of light. It had a lovely weight to it- noticeable, but not too heavy.

It was absolutely perfect, and it paled in comparison to the look in his eyes.  
>"Parker! Yes, of course- Oh my god! Yes!" She couldn't stop smiling if she wanted to as she pulled him to his feet and into an ardent kiss, losing herself in the movement of their lips. She was still processing his proposal. They'd been dating seriously for three years now, and had their ups and downs, but she hadn't seen this coming. She broke the kiss and wrapped him in a hug, holding him close, leaning her head against his, not believing the moment and not wanting it to ever, ever end.<p>

He really was hers forever.

"How are we going to tell everyone?" They were walking now, hand in hand on the beach, Parker half-guiding her as she admired the ring and lost track of where she was walking.

"I don't know. How do you want to tell them?" His voice was warm and a little bit giddy, his smile audible.

They quickly made plans: first June's parents at her place over dinner, then Parker's and then an engagement party for friends. Reluctantly rejected were Parker's idea of just surprising everyone with a party that was secretly a wedding, and June's idea of getting married and waiting for them to notice the rings. Maybe she could even get Annek to come back from the Capitol to celebrate with them. He'd been gone for four or five months already, and they hadn't heard a word except for a forwarding address. She missed him.

They spent the night together, reveling in the new direction of their lives.

~ReR~

"Emily, I need a favor." June was animated, a look of mischievous glee in her eyes as she practically vibrated where she stood.

"What is it? And why do you look like the cat that got the cream?" Emily found herself grinning before she even knew why.

June flashed her new ring in response, a delicate twirl and flourish of her hand, and the old friends fell into a fit a squeals and talking over each other. When they recovered themselves, June told the story of Parker's proposal, and their plan for later that night.

"So, I need a cake," she said, rattling off the flavor and decoration.

It was a small, simple vanilla and lavender cake (her favorite), with scrolling vines and winking purple blossoms trailing on the thick white icing. Emily had outdone herself, getting to work before June was even out of the cozy bake shop.

"Good luck!" she said, when June returned later that night to pick it up. Emily gave her a hug and a kiss on the cheek, feeling suddenly nostalgic and oddly maternal as her friend practically floated out of the shop. She looked down to see her fingers crossed.

~ReR~

As she was carrying the cake back in the dark, June was reflective. She had never been the prettiest growing up, but was a close third and more than made up for it with personality. Always the bridesmaid and never the bride, she'd stood steadfastly by as her friends paired off and tied the knot.

Each time, she'd carefully dried the bridesmaid bouquets. They were like a little garden, preserved reminders of the happiest days she shared with her friends. This one was blue and pink daisies. That one a single red rose. This one white and yellow sunflowers, that one ferns and plumeria blossoms, that one a ball of peonies on a silken cord. She had always been happy as she was, and had never been too invested in finding love or marrying off, preferring to dally with this one for a while, then stay a moment with another. She had been twenty-two before she had a relationship that had passed the half-year mark. Parker had been there since she was sixteen and he was nineteen, begging her to give him a chance every time she was unattached. Every time she turned him down, until he plain wore her down and she said yes more out of exasperation than any real passion for him. It wasn't that he wasn't handsome; he was a strapping lad and had his own share of unrequited love tossed his way. She just never felt for him one way or the other. Still, he was sweet enough, and safe, and being with him felt like being wrapped in the warmest blanket on the coldest night. The month she'd given him turned into two, to five and six and seven.

They fought, of course, over Parker's jealousy and her indifference. But after a while they fought out of fondness, rehashing the familiar points like a dance. And at their lowest point, when Parker gave up, when Parker said he was tired of loving an ice queen, it was she who stood on his doorstep, begging him to give her another chance. Somehow, this boy she was never interested in had become her sun, and he wanted her just as much. It was enough to make her twirl.

Now, at twenty-five, it was her turn to make her friends wear silly Capitol dresses and carry flowers. They'd be ranunculus. Or forgetmenots and roses. Maybe pansies. Babies' breath and violets?

The door was slightly open, even though she was pretty sure she'd closed it when she'd excused herself less than an hour before. She shrugged and pushed it open with her shoulder as she called out.

"So, unless Parker's already spoiled it, we have a little surprise for-"

The sight before her stunned her into silence mid-sentence and the cake fell from her hands, shattering the plate and coating her shoes and shins in white icing and pale purple cake bits. She didn't notice. The small and cozy kitchen was empty and dim, most of the lights having been smashed, the place utterly wrecked. Dishes destroyed, most of the meal on the floor. Overturned chairs. A deep crack running across the counter, as if something had been slammed into it with immeasurable force. There were holes, head-sized holes, all along the walls.

It was deathly quiet, the only sound was the slow and regular drip of quickly congealing blood off the hanging lamp above the table into the spreading puddle below, already browning at the edges. The air smelled like metal: iron and copper and tin. Flecks of gore were everywhere, bits of things her mind railed against. There was something that looked like a chunk of jawbone with gum and teeth still attached, but she refused to believe it.

Everything was coated in an absolutely, completely, utterly impossible amount of blood. The walls. The floor. Every flat surface. Even the ceiling bore splotches of red. A wide smear of it led down the back hallway floor. A bloody handprint scratched along the bottom of the white door at the end, as if someone had grabbed at it in a desperate bid for life or safety. She ran through, and saw nothing, heard no one in the dark.

Panic welled up inside her, but she shoved it down. It wasn't real, it was a joke. A sick joke. They were all all right, and just waiting to laugh with her about it.

"Parker?" Her voice was small; shrill and choked. "Parker!"

"Parker, this isn't funny!" she shouted.

There was no answer. Even the drip...drip...drip had stopped now, and the silence was pulsing in her ears.

"Mom?" She called. Tears were blurring the horrific smear in front of her to a river of red.

Silence.

"...Daddy?" she whispered.

With each unanswered call, something horrifying and abysmally black was bubbling up, and she sank to the floor, stricken. She put her hand on something slightly warm and very wet. She shrank away from it and looked, scared to see what she would find.

It was half of one of Parker's pale hands.

It started as a low moan, barely audible, until it was a high and piercing keen, a banshee scream.

A bit of purple cake that had been clinging to her leg landed in the puddle, turning red in the gloom.

~ReR~

June woke up with a start to a cold, soaked pillow, shaking hands, and a freshly breaking heart in the not-quite-light of the early morning. It'd been over a year now, closer to two, and every time she thought she was even beginning to heal, a nightmare would bring her right back to that edge.

She was alone, and her heart was cold again without him.

She clutched her pillow, flipping it to the dry side, and lost herself in a wave of despair, comforting herself with thoughts of oblivion until Marcus sprang to mind. She would never leave him to face the world alone. Could never. He and Emily were the only good things in her life now, and if she did, if she gave into selfishness, she'd be worse than his brother. Who was finally sleeping down the hall, after staying up half the night with one of his friends and crashing up the stairs. He'd nearly given her a heart attack in the process, leaving her to stare,wide-eyed and sweating, hardly daring to breathe, as she watched shadows stumble past the crack of light at the bottom of her door. And he'd been drunk, most likely. And Julia had bought right into whatever game he was playing, the silly little girl. She was sweet, but just... dumb when it came to Annek. A very cold and very un-June anger boiled up inside her.

Today would be one of those days then, it seemed; when ghosts of the past swirled and threatened to suffocate the future.

She left while it was still early in the morning, when the sun was bright and young and the dewy fog was still low on the ground. It was cool now, but it would be a scorcher by the end of the day. She didn't carry much. A baggie full of ice, a canteen of water, a crumpled up plastic bag, her wallet.

She hit the Market, wordlessly purchasing a small bouquet. Lina, the stallkeeper, gave a sympathetic smile and didn't press her. This silent transaction had happened before, and would happen again.

It wasn't a strenuous walk, but it was across town. She contemplated stopping by Emily's bakery, but she probably wasn't awake yet, and June didn't particularly feel like talking.

Her memories picked up where the nightmare left off.

Alarmed by the shrieking, the neighbors down the road had come running, and blanched at the sight of a blood- and cake-covered June and a wrecked house. They had gathered her, still screaming, into a warm shower and new clothes at their home. When she calmed down, she had gone with them to pick up Marcus, who had thrown a fit. He and his friends were just settling into a sleepover, and he was furious with her for taking him away when all the other boys got to stay. It wasn't even that late, he'd said. She'd clutched at him, bundled him into her arms even as he squirmed to get away, terrified that if she let him out of her sight he'd disappear as well. He hadn't understood they were all gone. She didn't know if she had, either. The neighbors left them soon after. They'd done more than they should. Nothing good would come of this, and it wouldn't do to get themselves mixed up in other people's wrongdoings.

June and Marcus had gone to Annek's Victor house, spooked by its looming facade in the blackness, spacious and cold and entirely un-homely, finding the spare set of keys under a barren flowerpot in the back. They'd huddled in what was now June's room, wrapped in scratchy blankets with a chair tucked under the handle. She hadn't let Marcus out of arms' length, occasionally reaching out to grab hold of his arm or just rub a hand on his back, to check that he was still there. She was never more relieved when the sun came up, or more devastated when daylight didn't change a thing. She didn't sleep properly for weeks, snatching an hour here and there, never at night. Finally, Emily had just drugged her, staying over to keep an eye on a lost-looking Marcus while she slept.

The Peacekeepers said they did a full investigation, and she was required to give a halting, broken statement in the Justice Building about what she'd seen. A few of them had volunteered to clean up the house in a rare moment of compassion. She remembered one in particular, his blue eyes so sad and determined when he stood up to request permission to clean up the crime scene, as four others followed reluctant suit. None of them would look her in the eye while she was giving her testimony, and she banished the implications from her mind- they couldn't possibly have done this. Peacekeepers were notoriously brash and lecherous; usually harmless, but obnoxious and loud, catcalling passersby from their posts (male and female alike) and generally behaving like rowdy teenagers with no supervision. Humanity, for them, was born out of enormous guilt; a stand-in for any kind of apology. She never let her mind speculate whenever she came across a gentleman in black riot gear. For them to volunteer...

It had been ruled that the trio had been involved in some asinine smuggling ring, and a boat belonging to Parker (that she'd never seen before) was found unmanned, drifting. The case was deemed 'aggravated homicide, organized crime related' and closed. That day she took scissors to her hair, and the waving lengths that had always filled her with pride, that Parker had loved to wind his hands in, were gone forever.

No one believed the reasons, but these things happened from time to time. It was best for everyone to join in with the party line and distance oneself from the survivors for a while.

There was no funeral, no burial, and no one wanted to waste time or money on empty caskets. People had withdrawn- almost everyone except Emily. Some of the bouquets in her garden grew bittersweet. It hadn't lasted long, only about a month until she and Marcus existed again, but Parker's parents had never forgiven her for killing their boy and neither they nor their friends (and they had a lot) had spoken to her since. She didn't blame them.

It had taken June a month to write the letter to Annek. She sent it off of two minds: she wished he didn't have to find out this way, but at least he'd finally be home again and she wouldn't have to support Marcus on her own. He had never replied. She wondered if he even got it. Emily was furious on her behalf. When the envelopes of money started appearing regularly shortly after, Emily declared that Annek had always been too arrogant for his own good. For him to think that June only wanted money from him was beyond the pale (even for him) and from that moment, he was dead to Emily; she refused to even listen to June talk about him. June had a very hard time disagreeing with her, but she held out hope her brother was redeemable. Until he started appearing with some new groupie every night. And getting carried out of clubs, too drunk to walk. And making awful, tawdry scenes in theaters. And cars. And in the streets. And in interviews.

Marcus had always been reserved, like her, but since it happened, he'd retreated into himself, preferring time alone or with the few who had stuck with him like Emily had for her. He had an uncanny sense of when she needed him nearby. Whenever she felt that edge of hysteria creeping in, paranoia about who was watching or what that look meant, he was there with a lighthearted story about what happened in school that day or a new drawing he was working on. He was always, always home on time at night. She joked, on those rare days that she could, that they could set their clock by him.

They never spoke about it. There was simply nothing to say.

~ReR~

She had been standing outside for about ten minutes, now. She always hated opening that damn door. Her shaking hand would go out, unlock it, grasp the handle, maybe even turn it before she backed away, overwhelmed and hyperventilating. This time it only took four tries- improvement.

She walked in timidly. It was dim, since the shades were drawn, and it smelled dusty. No one had been in since she had, ages ago.

June walked over to the table, one of the only pieces of furniture left. There on the stained wood was a clear, swirling glass vase. The water had long since evaporated and the flowers inside were quite dead; dry and brown and crumbly. Even the mold on the stems had turned to powdery dust.

She tossed them in the plastic bag, tying the handles together. She dumped the baggie of ice cubes in the vase and filled it with water from the canteen. Tenderly arranged the forgetmenots and the three poppies in full bloom. The vase misted over, and slow, heavy drops of condensation beaded up and rolled down the side, dampening the wood.

"I miss you guys."

She opened her mouth to say more, but the lump in her throat and stinging eyes prevented it. Not today, then.

"I miss you."

June left soon after, fiddling with the gently sparkling ring on her finger.


	18. Forward, Not Permanent

A/N: This chapter is one that merits an M.

* * *

><p>After Julia left, Annek had been deterred by the voice in the back of his head, whispering that it was a very, very stupid idea to blow off the Q n A.<p>

So he returned to home to put on presentable clothing; dark-wash jeans and a crisp white button down, June's cowrie shell necklace, tobacco-brown leather flipflops, and some "product", as Meghan called it, scraped haphazardly through his hair. Casual was good for the more intimate feel of one of these sessions. He grabbed his bag, shoved a pair of swim shorts in it along with his wallet, and headed out again, this time for the Depot. As he walked, though, his steps slowed, and the dread in the pit of his stomach grew heavier and heavier. By the time he reached the back of the building, a foul mood had settled around him, and he could feel, like some sort of premonition, that it would be a complete and utter shitshow. He hadn't been home; his family was disappeared. All they'd have to go on was him going to parties and bars and being carried out, and being found in bathrooms and hall closets with blushing groupies. Worst of all, there was the ghost of Doe haunting the town and the people in it. No one but Julia would even consider spending time with him, and when he passed, there weren't any joyous throngs to see him. There were hard faces, looking for answers, and he wasn't about to give them any.

He looked around for Meghan. She was turned away from him, cowing some Peacekeeper into submission through sheer force of will. Her conversation drifted his way, drips and strings of words.

_Keep them to the script. Trying to rehabilitate his reputation with Four. _

He took his opportunity, and fled.

~ReR~

Annek met up with Julia near her family's farm. They lived near the inland outskirts of town, and were one of the five families that grew sea kelp in vast fields stretching over Wards Seven, Eight, and Twelve. Julia was never too keen on farming, and preferred the hubbub of the market. Since kelp was recession-proof, her family had always been comfortable.

She was waiting near two ATVs, normally used by fieldworkers, which she'd commandeered earlier that day. One had a large basket strapped to the back, presumably full of lunch. The other had sleds, for reasons as yet unknown. Annek looked at the squat vehicles with no small measure of distrust. He didn't actually know how to drive.

"Ready?" Julia positively glowed with health and excitement. She had changed from earlier, he noticed- in place of jeans and flipflops, she wore shorts and camel-colored hiking boots. She had never cared for hats, but had tied her curls up and out of her face in a bouncy ponytail.

Annek was still feeling a little unsteady, and he was sure he looked more than a little peaked. He was liberal with the sunscreen, seeing as this was his favorite kind of day: just warm enough to be uncomfortable, but with a hearty sea breeze and a clear blue sky. Perfect.

Julia chose the ATV with the picnic basket, and after a quick lesson for Annek, they were off, tearing through grassy, fallow fields and towards the sand dunes a few miles away. It was her favorite place, secluded and quiet.

They reached a sparsely wooded grove that flanked the dunes. A wide, shallow creek meandered its way to the shoreline, and they spread out the blanket near it. Julia produced lunch; thick, sweet buns stuffed with barbecued pork, honeycrisp apples, tiny clementines, and custard-filled soft cakes.

Annek's face lit up. "How did you know I like these?" The small, flat, slightly sticky buns were his favorite, and far and away the stars of the spread.

"I didn't. I like them myself, and figured you'd have to put up with it if you didn't," she smirked.

"Oh, well, lucky me," he laughed.

They toasted their desserts, shared stories of the past year. Julia told of the storm that had knocked out power for a week, and Annek told her about the eccentricities of the Capitol, from fashion to mannerisms. He mocked Glinter's hair-flip and would-be coquette's smile, and Caesar Flickerman's overbearing double-handed handshake and too-loud laugh.

The conversation drifted to Annek's visit back home, and how he'd adjusted.

"Can I ask you something?" His voice was quiet, breaking a comfortable silence.

"Yeah, sure," she replied, around a mouthful of apple.

"Why..."

He cast about for the right words. "Literally every other person turned me down, and I can't really blame them. Why did you take me up on my offer?"

"It's not every day I get to have dinner with a Victor," she joked, neatly dodging the question.

"I'm serious." Annek was having none of it.

Julia took a sip from her water bottle, buying time.

She met his eyes. "Honestly, if I had known what you did in the Games, I wouldn't have. We, em... all of us here... we actually have a pact not to spend time with you because of Doe. But after you explained, well.. I understand. You were just trying to survive, and I can't say I'd do anything differently. You have to carry that with you the rest of your life; you don't need my help in feeling crap about it."

He was thoughtful, staring at the space between them. "Thanks." It was almost to himself, but Julia felt the weight of his words.

"Besides, I wanted to see just how soft you'd gotten in the Capitol. You're already picking up their esses," she ribbed, trying to lighten the mood.

It was true. Somehow the elongated 's' sound had begun slipping into his speech. He didn't really know how to feel about it.

He didn't know how to feel about a lot of things. Neither of them brought up last night, though it was just under the surface, each feeling the others' eyes on them. Annek didn't think holding her in bed and the subsequent kiss had actually happened, though he wished they had; it felt so real. He remembered most of the night, when he shifted to lay his head in her lap and felt her slender fingers running through his hair, but the morphling had washed out almost everything else, like overexposure or lens flare on a photo.

"So, wanna see what the sleds are for?" She stood up and dusted herself off, changing the subject and her train of thought, and Annek followed suit.

"I think I know now, actually." He remembered sledding on sand dunes with June years and years ago.

The dunes were hulking, miniature mountains covered in dense patches of beach grass and stunted trees, with slaloms of bare sand. They formed a bowl of earth, huddling against a small and intimate beach with the whole wide ocean spreading out in front of them. It was easy to believe that nothing lay beyond the dunes; the quiet air and general calm felt like they were the first two people on earth at all.

They shared Annek's ATV up a particularly tall one. He was hyper- aware of her arms wrapped around his waist, her warm body hugging his, her soft chest pressed into his back, her chin on his shoulder as she told him where to go, how she squeezed him tighter as they ascended and the wheels kicked up sand... He was very glad she was sitting behind him, and not the other way around. They reached the top, and he took a moment to compose himself before he followed her to the edge, sipping from a water bottle. Julia untied the sleds and handed one to Annek. She refreshed him on how to steer, using his body weight to guide the light, bright plastic.

"Last one down has to come back up for the ATV!" Julia shouted and pushed off.

Annek followed. They were neck and neck at exhilarating speed, weaving around patches of grass, catching air from divots and mounds of sand. It was intoxicating, but over all too soon. Annek won by a slim margin, and they slowed to a stop some distance away from the foot of the sand hill. Annek lay back, breathless and exhilarated, grinning from ear to ear. He'd forgotten how much of a rush it was, and let out an exultant whoop.

Julia hung her head in mock shame and laughed.

"March, Miss March," he gloated, pointing up.

He watched her as she started up the hill, struggling in the piled sand and steep grade, and he drank in the moment. He almost felt like he was floating, lighter than air. He hadn't felt this good without booze or morphling since... well, he didn't really remember. He realized he didn't want to waste the hour it would take her to get back up the hill twiddling his thumbs all by himself. He strapped his sled to his back by threading his arms through the rope along the sides, and jogged to catch up with her. She looked pleased to see him, and eyed the sled.

"I'm nothing if not a gracious winner," he said with exaggerated formality, giving her a bow. She smiled, and turned her attention to the climb. Their small talk was soon replaced by panting as they climbed, moving from one patch of grass to the next. Annek was childishly pleased by the fact that she took longer and more frequent breaks than he did. The thought came unbidden that Glinter would never have made it at all. Julia looked at home here, confident and radiant even as she navigated the ankle-deep sand.

They made it to the top in forty-five minutes, panting and drenched in sweat. She walked over to the ATV and swung her leg over, but Annek set up the sled and beckoned her to join him.

"Who's going to come back up this time?"

"I have a plan, dear, trust me. Come on." He held out a hand and quirked an eyebrow.

She sized him up, then settled in in front of him. Her bouncy ponytail tickled his nose, and he tried not to sniff it but it smelled amazing. They pushed off and flew back down the hard-won climb. They had almost made it down when Annek hit a grassy patch in just the wrong way.

They fell off with a shriek from Julia and went tumbling and sliding down, landing in a tangled heap of limbs against a grassy patch, the sled bouncing away harmlessly. Annek landed on top of her, but held most of his weight propped on his arms. She landed on her side, turning over quickly to meet his gaze, hand braced on his forearm.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Never better," she breathed.

Neither actually wanted to move, until Annek reluctantly shifted to release her and Julia pulled him down into a feverish kiss. _So that really did happen. _

He dropped to his elbows and cradled her head in his hands as she wrapped her legs around him and kicked off her boots and socks. In record time, she found the spot on his throat that made him shiver and pause with his head against her shoulder.

He was drunk on her body, sliding rough hands down her solid, silky curves. The vast majority of girls in the Capitol were weak, thin and a little bony, but Julia was toned and strong, her wide, sinuous hips beckoning. He felt her lifting off his shirt, and he raised his arms to help her, returning the favor by dragging her shorts off.

He kissed her stomach, tasting the salt on her skin, and found the spot in the crease of those hips that made her giggle and squirm and gasp and fist her hands in his hair when he nuzzled it. He moved a little lower, pulling the soft, slippery fabric aside, until she bucked and her back arched and she shuddered in the most delicious way.

His hands and his mouth made their way back up her lithe stomach, pushing her orange tank out of the way and a ripple of pleasure moved through him as she raked her short nails down his chest and hooked her fingers in the waistband of his shorts, pulling him closer, drinking him in, pulling herself up to meet him, catching his lips with her own. He sat up then lay back in the hot sand as she straddled him, lifting her bunched shirt and the swim top underneath away in one smooth motion. Her eyes were dark with desire and the knowing little smile she wore –-she was good, she knew it, and he would too by the end of things- sent his blood coursing even faster as she ran those fingers everywhere and he reached a hand up to touch her.

She mimicked him, kissing her way up the taut planes of his abs, tickling him with the curls that she had released from her ponytail, adjusting herself so she knelt between his thighs. He very nearly crashed over the edge as she laid him bare and swept him into her hand with her cool fingers, never taking her lips off his throat. He was aching fiercely now, and lay back with a soft groan of pleasure as she captured him, digging his heels in the sand. It was so different when he didn't have to pretend he wanted whomever he was with, a massive, electrifying head rush he hadn't experienced for a long while now.

He twined his fingers in her disheveled curls and was at peace with the world and everything in it until she pulled his wrists down to his side and pinioned him. She closed her eyes and lingered, teasing, keeping a firm grip on his wrists as he tried in vain to pull free. Old panic came to the surface and he tried to stay present, stay with her, but she heard a strangled little "Stop" and felt him go suddenly, rigidly still beneath her. She looked up to find his jaw clenched and eyes squeezed shut.

"Annek?" She hadn't expected that reaction at all. She sat back, and he opened his eyes.

"I uh, I'm not really a sub." His voice was gravelly and low, thick with shame.

"Oh..." Julia didn't quite understand, but didn't want to force the issue.

He sat up and rubbed his face with both hands, but couldn't look her in the eye.

They tried again, with tentative kisses and halting, self-conscious fingers, but it was too late; the moment that had swept them away was gone.

"Sorry," he whispered.

He sheepishly pulled up his swimming shorts as she found her own without a word and slipped her top back on, dusting sand from her skin.

He didn't sit up, but caught her hand and pulled her down beside him. She seemed relieved and curled into his side, resting her head on his shoulder and intertwining their fingers.

His free hand drifted up to stroke her hair and they were quiet for a long while, watching the sky, and enjoying the sensation of wind on cooling skin. He very nearly fell asleep.

"So..." Julia was the first to break the silence.

"Hungry?" he asked impishly, and she took mock offense, slapping him on the chest.

"Are... are you okay?" It was gentle, not wanting to offend.

"Of course." He was earnest. "I had a... bad experience a while back and I'm still not quite over it. It

didn't have anything to do with you, though," he said hastily.

"Mm," she murmured. "We should get back. It's getting late." She snuck a kiss on his cheek as she stood up and he laughed.

The sun was getting lower, early evening, sending bright shafts of golden light across the water. They walked hand in hand back to the clearing, and Julia grabbed Annek's apple as he started the other ATV. She snuggled in behind him, letting her hands wander where they would.


	19. Aftermath

Annek and Julia had spent the night together, getting absolutely no sleep at all in varied and inventive ways. So when he arrived back at the house, late the next morning, seeing Meghan having a cup of coffee with his sister made perfect sense. The facts they'd never met and it was a toss-up over whether they'd get along never registered. June never really got on with forceful girls, and "forceful" was the best word to describe Meghan. He gave a happy little wave to them both before he headed for the steps, taking them one at a time, replaying the night in his mind. He didn't hear Meghan get up or her footsteps walking over to him. He didn't really notice anything until she grabbed his elbow so tightly her nails dug into his skin. He winced, and she relaxed a fraction of an inch. He stared dumbly at her, and feebly tried to pull his arm away. Things finally clicked, and the blood drained from his face.

Oh.

He was supposed to make a very important public appearance, the first Question and Answer session since he'd been on probation, and he hadn't even told her he was blowing it off. The gravity of it swept away all the good feelings he'd built up.

"Come have a seat at the table. We need to talk," she said with a pleasantish, polite smile that didn't in the least match how angry she sounded. It was like the crackling, tense air before a lightning strike, and fear, at last, shimmered through him. He allowed himself to be led to the table and dumped unceremoniously in a chair, his blood racing.

June took her leave almost as soon as he sat down, giving him a disappointed look before she turned away and left. It made it clear that he had come up very far short in almost every significant way, and that hurt worse than when she had yelled at him before.

Meghan shoved a mug of steaming black coffee in front of him, and glared as he took a swig. It was still scorching hot, and he grimaced in pain as it burned his tongue. Meghan was unmoved.

"Where'd you go?"

That was it. Just that question hung in the air, damning.

"Um. Meghan, I can explain. I went to see a friend, and I just lost track of-"

She held up a finger. "Stop. If all you're going to give me is excuses and bullshit, shut up."

He shut up, wide-eyed and staring and somehow still trying to attest to his innocence through his body language: a casual shoulder shrug; penitent open hands.

"Do you know why President Snow signed off on you coming back here for twelve days, when you haven't been let out of the Capitol in a year?" She sounded like she was talking to a very young, incredibly stupid child.

He shook his head. There wasn't any good reason for President Snow to let Annek come home. He was thinking it through, when the idea hit him square in the face. Surely it couldn't have been...?

"This was a test, to see if you could be trusted enough get off of probation. And you failed, Annek. You failed." Meghan wasn't empathetic. She wasn't anything but angry, and hurt, and let down, but mostly angry.

Annek froze, his face almost comically surprised, as that sank in.

"Why the hell didn't you tell me that?" he spat, defensive and angry, mostly at himself.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realise I'd have to ask you to show up_ to the event we came here for_. And thanks so much for leaving me holding the bag, and with televised proof I can't handle my Victor. I look absolutely awful from every angle. Either I knew about this, and I could be tried for_ treason,_ or, I didn't know, and I'm incompetent enough to have to be_ replaced._ So either you tell me where the hell you went during the one-hour window you were on the clock for, or you can just ready yourself to be under house arrest and have a stylist who doesn't give half a good damn about you or your family."

Annek was riling himself up for a proper retort to her sarcasm, but the last part deflated him. He hadn't realised he could lose Meghan, or that skipping out would put her in so much danger. When he spoke again, it was a little timid.

"We can't reschedule?"

"No, we can't reschedule, and the train back to the Capitol leaves as soon as it arrives from District Six." Meghan was matter-of-fact, her voice snapping. 'You idiot' was subtext, but only just barely.

"But we still have a whole week left here!"

"Not now, we don't." It was patronizing, and Annek bristled, even as he shrank away from her. She'd never been this angry with him.

"Well, why not?"

"Damage control."

Annek took that in, keeping his face as neutral as possible. "When does the train leave?"

"Eleven forty-five tonight. I swear on my mother, Annek, if you are not on that train, so help me-"

"I'll be there. I will," he said, trying to convince her. "I just need to take care of a few things first."

"Like_ what_?"

"Like saying goodbye, all right? Like making sure I'm not just disappearing again." His voice was strained, and Meghan sighed, giving in.

"I want you waiting at the Depot at eleven fifteen. Not a minute after." Meghan looked like she was debating just locking him in his room until then, so he stood, asking permission with a look.

"Eleven ten," he shot, and then grimaced, sensing he'd overstepped.

Meghan glowered at him, and he fled.

He climbed the stairs three at a time, trying not to actually run away from her. He reached his room, and stopped short. All of his bags, including the one with the morphling, were neatly stacked by the door, waiting for him. His insides clenched, and he looked at June's closed door. But he didn't have the heart for another scolding. He grabbed the little pink slip of customer copy carbon paper on his nightstand, detailing his order with Palek, and headed downstairs, casting a quick, guilty glance at Meghan. She sat watching him, stylus poised over her notebook. In spite of the heat, he shivered as he closed the door and headed for the Market.

Twelve hours.

~ReR~

The kayak was a work of art. Crafted entirely of plex, clear as glass, thin and glossy and as durable as steel, in a boat size Marcus could grow into. When it was on the water and the water was calm, you could see for what felt like miles down. It was like you were floating on nothing at all. Annek was certain Marcus would love it. He gave the grizzled man an extra ten gold on top of what he'd already given him. The stooped man was even more proud of it than_ Evangeline_, and he ran a few bent fingers across the hull fondly.

'You take care of_ Clara_, you hear? Or I'll come take her back. Don't care how much you paid," he growled.

"Marcus will have her back by supper," he grinned. The older man didn't crack a smile until Annek left.

Eleven hours.

~ReR~

The path was weedy. Grass growing between and through cracked stone pavers, and the flowers his parents planted dead, choked with some sort of strangling ivy. It was crawling up the house as well, covering windows and stretching tendrils up to the roof. Only the door was still sort of clear.

He opened it, smelling the damp and must, his eyes adjusting slowly to the dimness. When they did, he wished they hadn't.

It was so different. He remembered the table off to the side, where Marcus would study, pestering anyone passing by for homework help. It was stained and bare, except for a vase of very fresh flowers, ice still in the glass container and the blooms still bright and alive. Three poppies, surrounded by a spray of winking blue forget-me-nots. His throat closed and his eyes stung. He looked away, around to the rest of the house. It was clean, empty. There had been violence here, and none of that was fixed. A nest of cobwebs was in one of the holes along the wall and he felt sick. He wandered down the short hall to his and Marcus' old room, running a finger across the etchings showing the children's growth in the door frame. Marcus at two and three and four, all the way up to twelve. Annek and June up to eighteen. The double mark where Marcus and June were the same height at age nine, Annek just a little shorter.

He took his finger away.

He walked away, then, down the hall and out of the door. He set the kayak on the path and kicked his way through the tangle of dead plants to the side of the house and seized handfuls of ivy from the stonework. He pulled, and the ivy resisted, clinging to stone and cement. He pulled harder. It ripped away, leaving little feet attached to the rough stone. He threw it away from the house, and grabbed another handful. It pulled away as well. He kept at it, tearing at the invasive plants until the sun was halfway down and the cottage was bare, the offending ivy in a wilting pile on the overgrown grass, the brown stems of his parents' shrubbery free and clear. His throat was parched and his lips were cracked, and he felt like he was dying of thirst. His hands were a mess, cut by thorns and scratched by unforgiving stone, the pads of his fingers and palms raw from friction, but he picked up the kayak and headed back to the Victor's Village, some small part of him settled and at peace.

Five hours.

~ReR~

Annek made his way back to the house in the Victor's Village. He remembered the first time he saw it, how grateful he was for the space, and the air conditioning for the summers and springs, and not having to share a room with Marcus anymore, for the views, and the private beach. He found it had no luster anymore. It was too big, and too spacious. He missed hearing the soft, slow breaths of his little brother as he slept in the top bunk, the bond they shared when it was purple-black night and they whispered to each other about really anything at all. He missed his parents being there, watchful and listening for him or June to sneak out. He headed inside, feeling the chill blast of air conditioning, and wished with all his heart that Vesuvius Greenland, a portly man with fingers so thick his rings dug into them and turned the tips red and purple, had called another boy's name two years ago.

Meghan was gone, and there wasn't any sign of June.

He took the clear plex kayak out to the beach, laying it behind the shed with all their other boats. He went inside to change into swimming gear, pulling a pair of board shorts from his dresser since his luggage had disappeared. He was careful to slather on the sunscreen this time, and called for his brother.

"Marcus, are you here?"

There was no response, but some shuffling down the hall, and a door opened. "Yeah, why?"

"Get your swim trunks on. We're going out."

Marcus didn't bother to reply, dashing into his room and appearing nearly instantly at the top of the stairs in lime green trunks and sporty sunshades, his thin chest streaked with white from sunblock. He was almost bouncing with excitement.

"Go out like that, and you'll come back a zebra. Come on, do it right." He grinned, feeling his little brother's enthusiasm rub off on him as he headed down the stairs.

"I have a present for you. I told you I didn't want you going out in _Evangeline, _remember? She's too big for you, and if you flipped, I don't think you could get her back over."

"You said, already. I won't do it again." It was just a bit petulant, as well as earnest.

"Well, I made sure of it." Annek held the door as Marcus jetted through, heading for the shoreline. "Get to the water, and then cover your eyes. Be careful of waves," he instructed.

"You better not push me in!"

"I won't. You're just being paranoid," Annek laughed, picking up the new boat and a paddle and setting it in the water in front of his brother. Annek grinned in anticipation. "Okay, you can open them."

Marcus did, first one, then the other, and then gaped at the boat that seemed to disappear where it touched the water.

"Really?"

"Yup. Palek named her _Clara_, and said he'd take her back if he found out she wasn't being taken care of."

Marcus moved to touch it reverently. "I swear, I'll take the best care of her! I promise!"

"Good. Get used to her while I get ready and then we'll head out, okay?"

"Okay!"

Annek pushed Marcus out, heading to get _Evangeline _and a few fishing rods, and making his way himself, pushing off from the gravelly beach with his paddle. Marcus paddled in slow, wide circles, getting used to handling the boat. True to Palek's artistry, Marcus maneuvered the boat easily, navigating the wavelets and turning with ease.

Soon they were gliding towards the breakwater, locked in a dead heat. Of course, Annek was holding back, not wanting to beat his little brother too handily. To his surprise, however, Marcus sped forward, reaching the rougher water a full length ahead of Annek.

"Ha! I win," he crowed, paddling faster still, "You can't beat me anymore."

Annek grinned, letting his brother gloat even as he quickly closed the distance. "I'll catch more fish and beat you back."

"How much you wanna bet?"

"You don't have any money," Annek scoffed.

"So?"

"You have to have money to bet, Marcus."

"Not really. I just have to win."

Annek had to laugh, and they raced towards a secluded fishing spot, not too far away from the house.

They stayed for a few hours, careful not to take too many fish, and didn't turn in until it was black above and black below, only pinprick lights from houses and memory guiding them back to shore. Annek watched proudly as Marcus rinsed _Clara_ off without prompting, going the extra mile of buffing the boat dry with a soft cloth in the pool of yellow light from the tall lamp beside the boat shed. As he was heading towards the house, he was nearly tackled from behind. His heart leapt into his throat, and his eyes went wide as he reached a hand back to grab his attacker.

"Thank you so much! I love it!"

Annek grinned, relaxing in an instant, spinning around to wrap his little brother in a bear hug. "I knew you would," he said. "Mind you take care of her."

"I will, I promise! And you said that already."

"Come on, let's get inside." Annek kept an arm around the smaller boy, casting a quick glance around as he shut the door.

One hour.

Annek rubbed his hands together, steeling himself in order to knock on June's closed door. He knocked twice, and was ignored.

"June?" It was a tentative and deferential.

Silence.

He tried again, louder this time.

"June, it's me, Annek. Can I talk to you? Please? I don't have much time." He tried to keep the pleading tones out of his voice, but didn't entirely succeed.

At long last she responded, opening the door and standing in the frame, preventing him from coming in or even seeing inside her room. He lost his voice for a minute, gazing at the raw anger and hurt in her face, eyes red-rimmed.

"What do you need to say to me?" It was pointed, and Annek quailed for a moment.

"I—I'm sorry. I really screwed up, and I have to go back tonight. In an hour."

Her face darkened, and she scoffed. "Why so soon? Did you get yourself in trouble, and now you're running away?" Her voice was scornful, and he didn't bother arguing. There was no time. He didn't have the energy, regardless.

"Yeah, I did. I shouldn't have blown off everything, and I want to stay, I really do, but it's out of my control."

"Like you have even a shred of self-control left anymore, Annek."

His shoulders sagged, but he didn't respond, weathering the storm of her anger.

"Drugs, Annek? Really? In this house, around Marcus? What if something… went wrong? What if he found you like that?" She had shifted from angry for herself, to livid on Marcus' behalf, and it took effort to stand there and simply take it. He deserved it, he knew. There was no doubt about that part, but he had good reasons. It wasn't like he was doing it for fun. Still, he was silent.

"That was stupid, too. I wasn't thinking. But please. I need to tell you something, and we just don't have time. Please!"

She stared at him, hazel eyes sharp and incisive, full of hostility and judgment, clearly evaluating him. He tried to not look completely guilty and utterly desperate.

She opened the door to her room.

It was stark, to the point of sterility. There was her bed with a thick purple comforter, and the walls were soothing taupes, and the walk-in closet was filled with her clothes in neat rows, but there was nothing like her room in the cottage. There was nothing marking it as hers.

His heart twisted.

"I wanted to say I'm sorry. For everything. For never writing you back when… when it happened."

June's face pulled taut, and she took a step back. "Why wouldn't you come home, though, Annek? Just tell me that."

"I couldn't. I wasn't allowed."

"You're a Victor. You can do anything."

"That President Snow lets me. It's not like it seems." It was defensive, and more than he wanted to say, but he pressed on. "I never meant things to be like this, June. You have to believe me. I don't want you to hate me."

She stayed away, wary and disbelieving, backed against the bureau that came with the house. But there was no time, and he had to leave. He came toward her, a little stiffly, and pulled her into a hug.

She resisted, hand pushing against his neck and an elbow digging into his side. "Get off!"

"I'm sorry." He held her tightly, willing her to believe him.

"Annek, let me go right now. I'm warning you." She twisted in his grip, trying to break free, sliding along the bureau in an attempt to get away. He held fast, through the fist that hit him on the temple and made him see stars for a moment.

"I'm sorry," he said, saying it over and over, waiting her out.

It was three minutes before he felt her stop fighting, her arms wrapping around his neck and her face resting against his shoulder, hugging him back.

"Please don't leave," she whispered, and his throat closed.

"I don't have a choice. I'd stay if I could, I swear. I swear to god, June." He struggled to keep himself from sobbing in a very unmanly way, but before he knew it, they were on their knees and she was stroking his hair and whispering that it would be all right, but he had to stop before Marcus overheard.

"I can't go back. I can't do this," he said, holding on to her shoulders and staring into her eyes, very much her younger brother.

She sat him up with effort, holding his head in her hands, rubbing the bruise beginning to form on his face with her thumb, as if it could be erased.

"I don't know what's going on right now, Annek, and I hope sincerely that you'll tell me when you can, but you need to be strong, and you need to bear up, okay?" Her voice was soft and encouraging, as if he were crying about a skinned knee and she was about put that stinging disinfectant on it.

He looked up at her, pleading and silent, only with effort calming himself. He could see she was as scared at this outburst as he was, but it had broken through what was between them, even if only for the moment, and they were only June and Annek, brother and sister.

"It's going to be okay. You'll be back, right? You'll come back, and we'll be together as a family again. We have to hope."

He nodded. He didn't even know if he wouldn't be killed as soon as he got back to the Capitol, but he nodded, sucking in a huge, shaky breath.

"So you're gonna go back with your head held high, right? Because you're an Alda, and you're a Victor, and you're my brother."

His chin wobbled at the last, but he stood up, bringing her up with him. She picked up one of his hands.

"I'm here with you." She was decided, now, even if none of it made sense. He was her brother and he needed her.

"I love you," he said.

"I love you, too."

He hugged her again, a ripple of hope moving through them.

~ReR~

Marcus was not so understanding. He stood poleaxed, rooted to the spot as June held his hand, before he ripped his away and ran out of the house towards the beach. Annek would never forget the look he gave him: searing, damning and full of reproach beyond his years. But there was no time to make it right.

~ReR~

Annek stalked past Meghan onto the train, his face mottled and puffy, clutching the cowrie shell necklace June had pressed into his palm before he left.

He grabbed the nearest bottle of whatever promised to get him drunk, and slammed his door.


	20. The Guilt That Eats and Never Dies

Annek dressed quickly in the clothes Meghan had picked out for him, excited for the night to start. It had been about four months already since he'd gotten the letter from President Snow, telling him that as a Victor, one of his duties was to appear in the Capitol to celebrate the opening of the upcoming Game season. Party nights were the best. It was only his sixth, but he was somebody, here, and it didn't even matter any more that Lina didn't want him- Lina could bite him. Here, he had his choice of everything. Drinking and laughing with other Victors, dazzling starstruck Capitol girls, it almost made him forget.

He missed home, and sincerely regretted that he'd been too busy to see his parents. He'd seen Marcus and June, and Lina, but the timing was never right to see his mom or dad. He was tired, or they were working. He'd thought he would have more time. The Victory Tour had taken ages, and he'd only been in Four for about a week or so, settling into the enormous house when the letter came and he went off to the glittering Capitol. Part of him had been relieved, if he was honest with himself. The nights he actually slept, he only ever dreamed of Doe, of those last moments she was alive, and he still couldn't bring himself to visit her parents. He consoled himself with the fact he'd be back in Four soon enough; the Reaping was only a few months away. This gave him time to compose himself and think of something to say before he had to see them.

Besides that, the Capitol was his playground now. He was richer than god himself and the newest member of the elite. After what he'd been through, he deserved some mindless entertainment. His smile was genuine as he strolled into the enormous hall. He was still a little nervous about talking people up, but two drinks and he was an easygoing, chatty fellow. He snagged a glass of something deep gold (and delicious) from an Avox and searched the throng for a familiar face, smiling and toasting all the while. Whatever he was drinking was smooth and sweet. He'd have mistaken it for grape juice if it didn't set his head and fingertips to buzzing so fast.

He found his second and third glasses of icewine with Jacques Henri. The other Victor was talking to an older socialite, who had her hands all over the tattooed and dreadlocked man. He and Meghan had shown Annek how to interact with fans and get around the Capitol, guiding the younger boy away from getting too wasted at parties and letting his guard down. Jacques was probably the closest thing he had to a friend here. They chatted, Jacques filling him in on the notable people in the room.

He was kind of distant, for the first time, and it threw Annek. Usually, Jacques called him over and slipped an easy arm over his shoulders as he introduced him to some wealthy citizen or another. But tonight, it was like he was trying to shoo him away. He took the hint, shaking his head at Jacques' taste in women and wandered around. It was only about 2230.

He tried to pull, flirting shamelessly with a few girls and a boy for the sport of it, until he saw President Snow coming towards him, flanked by a grim-looking man Annek took for security. Snow had never approached Annek at a party before, in fact Annek had only met him at his Victor's ceremony as Snow had crowned him with the laurel wreath. Annek didn't really like him, but he put on a smile as his quarry fled. After the customary pleasantries, Snow gestured to the silent man beside him.

"Annek, I'd like you to meet Mr. Copperfell. He's responsible for some of the gifts you received in the Arena." His voice was oily, too smooth for the puffy face.

Annek thanked the man with a genuinely warm smile and shook his hand, the heady icewine making him effusive.  
>"Thank you so much! It's great- really, really great to meet you."<p>

Copperfell was a slim, imposing figure in a sleek monochromatic suit, a full head taller than Annek. Everything about him whispered wealth. The thick, rich cloth of his suit had a brushed sheen. Annek could practically see himself in the glossy leather of his wingtips. His cufflinks and tie bar were a metallic black, matching the thin wire frames of his glasses. The carnation in his suit-pocket was clearly custom-bred- the petals were gray melting into black near the tips. He didn't smell like anything at all, a relief after the pungent Snow. He looked out of place at the party; a stark, chic blade of black where everyone was drenched in color and volume. He was perfectly pleasant to Annek on the surface, but he seemed to be sneering at him with every word he said.

Annek made awkward chit-chat for a while, answering questions like what life was like at home for him and how he was finding the Capitol with the practiced answers Meghan had drilled with him, before he realised that Snow was gone, slunk off some time before, and he was alone with the man in black. Annek was kicking himself for going overboard a little too fast. He was near-gone from the icewine, dizzy and too quick to laugh at his own jokes or things that weren't funny, slurring and stumbling over difficult syllables. He'd switched to water and he was just beginning to sober up when Mr. Copperfell said he'd treat him to dinner and introduce Annek to some of Copperfell's own dearest friends. Annek tried to decline, but he found himself in the back of a limo before he knew what to think.

He didn't get it. This guy had saved Annek's life -gifting him the coagulin that stopped him from bleeding out on the island- but why would he be so interested? He was just some kid from Four, and this guy was on top of the world, from the look of it.  
>He asked before he thought better of it, and the man replied that he had taken an interest in the Games quite a few years back.<p>

"I mislike watching promising athletes fail because of bad luck. Or 'frigging mermaids', as you put it." Copperfell didn't turn to look at him, but a tight smile played on his thin, bloodless lips.

Annek looked around. They were underground, driving in a tunnel. He hadn't been this way before, and he thought he'd explored most of the city and surrounding suburbs. It wasn't long before they turned off into a parking lot and the car let them out at the revolving door. An Avox manned the elevator just inside. He noticed it skipped every four floors, with last names printed on each available floor. E. Copperfell was on the sixteenth. He didn't have time to recognize any of the others.

He soon found out why; the apartment took up all four floors, a massive geometric staircase dominating the entranceway. It was bright and cheerful inside, all pale yellows and mint greens and eggshell white.

There was no one there, however; not even Avoci, which was unusual for a man of Copperfell's standing. Even Annek had one at his disposal, though he avoided making use of the poor man. He was cold sober now, and the hair on the back of his neck was standing up, but Annek couldn't pin it on any one thing in particular. He decided not to say anything; if Copperfell suspected he thought something was up, it would be that much more difficult to escape.

They sat down to dinner, some ponderous haunch of beast and unremarkable vegetables already on the table, not at all the norm. He'd learned from the Victor's Banquet that in the Capitol, presentation was half the battle and the larger the menu, the better.

He was suddenly incredibly thirsty and drained his glass of water as they took their seats. Annek picked at the next-door-to-tasteless food on his plate, trying to be polite, answering questions he was sure Copperfell had asked before, but it became harder and harder with each passing bite. It was like his blood had turned to sludge. He felt his heart skip several beats- a long stretch of quiet where never was quiet before- then begin to thud leaden and heavy in his chest as his vision began to tunnel. The fork slipped out of his fingers and crashed onto the plate, the noise ringing like a siren in his ears. He sucked in a keening breath as he met Copperfell's gaze. The man was leaning forward, watching Annek eagerly with such hunger in his eyes that Annek knew with sudden, inescapable certainty he was lost.

He tried to get up, to run, but it was like moving through cold molasses; slow and ineffectual movements that soon ceased entirely as he slid sideways, fingernails scratching across the glossy, enameled-wood tabletop, knocking over his glass as he went down.

Faster than he'd seen him move the entire night, the man in the black suit was catching him as he fell towards the floor, lifting Annek's smaller, more solid frame with some difficulty. The world turned upside-down and bounced with Copperfell's burdened, unsteady gait; he was climbing stairs, losing his balance and lurching backwards a few times. Annek's nose bashed into his bony hip with each step until he was dazed, aware of nothing but overwhelming terror and the warm, tickling trickle of blood that stung as it blinded his eye and snaked into his hairline. He waited, primed to fight against the approaching blackness of the drug, but he soon realized with creeping dread that it was never coming. Whatever he'd been drugged with blocked his ability to move, but left him awake, and worse, aware.

He was tossed face-first onto an overly-soft bed. He could barely breathe to begin with, unable to swallow at all, half-choked with clotting blood. The pillowy mattress was smothering him. His lungs burned fiercely, sparks of light exploded in his eyes, and he felt himself begin drift very far away until his head was roughly pushed to the side, a hand braced against it for leverage, and the sweetest air he'd ever known leaked through.

He was naked now, and powerless to cover himself.

He felt hands, and terrible weight, and could not move away.

He was destroyed in that moment, shattered in a burst of blinding pain, and he could not scream.

Hot tears cooled slowly on his cheek, and he endured.

It lasted hours. The man left and came back as he pleased; each time he left, Annek desperately tried to make his body obey him, and every time the man returned, Annek was still there, unmoved.

Through it all, the previously laconic man ranted; vitriol and black hatred for all of the Victors, for the Districts. For him especially, the cowardice displayed in killing his District-mate. She had been meant for Copperfell, didn't Annek see? Sometimes he seemed to hate Annek personally, and others he was raging at everything and nothing in particular. Sometimes he even seemed apologetic; he spoke in "had to have beens" and "couldn't help myselfs" as he ran a tentative hand along Annek's side, kissed his fingertips, or tenderly cleared bloodied hair from his face. He mocked him. He beat him, blows raining down on his unprotected, immobile flesh until blood and vomit filled his mouth and Annek was sure a rib was broken again. He defiled and humiliated him in every possible way. He threatened him, dangling a knife in front of him, dragging it along his skin to form jagged, ruby red patterns, until all Annek could see was the shining metal of the blade and his pinprick pupil reflected in it, unable to look away.

The man pulled him down off the bed, letting him crash into the floor like a sack of flour, dragging him down the carpeted hallway to a narrow bathroom. He chained him to an antiquated towel bar, his arm wrenched fully behind him and the dead weight of his torso straining the joint and puckering the thin metal of the bar where the handcuff bit in.

Copperfell left him with a final, savage kick to his kidney and he was alone, wheezing in the dark, the air cold on his sweat and blood- slicked bare skin.

Annek wished that if he had to die here, in the hands of this psychopath, he'd have done and kill him already. He was in agony. He had no idea what was going on, how this happened. He wanted so desperately to be home.

He drifted in and out of consciousness, the regular drip of the tap just enough to lull him away. He was warm, and nothing hurt. He was a child again, in his mother's lap. She was singing a lullaby, stroking his hair with gentle fingers. He could feel the song humming along in her chest as she rocked him, see the light and love in her eyes as she smiled down at him. He wrapped his tiny, chubby arms around her neck, inhaled her poppies-and-powder perfume. He was safe in the world of her soft arms, and nothing could hurt him, until the slow tap of water on metal reminded him that he was drugged in a Capitol bathroom, about to die, far from home.

He realized that he could move again when he began shivering, teeth chattering. Each tremor sent a shock of pain to his probably broken nose. He felt like he was missing a lung. He coughed, and heard the wet slap of blood against the tile, iron and bile in his mouth; felt the ripping, stabbing pain of the shards of rib shredding something inside. There in the dark, despair curdled into rage, crystallized into murderous hate. The hours of being a ragdoll had taken their toll, overstretched muscles loath to obey him, but he grit his teeth and endured. He began working the towel rack free from the tiles it was fastened into. His fingernails wore and ripped down to the quick picking at the screws. Finally he had one side loose, and only one screw left on the other when the door slammed open, the lights flicked on, and Copperfell strolled in. He'd removed his tie and jacket and rolled up the sleeves on his button-down sometime in the hours before. He was a picture of wealthy leisure, excepting the fact that the previously matte black front of his shirt was wet and shiny, and his forearms were streaked with Annek's blood.

He stared, surprised, at Annek, who met him standing, his ruinous face twisted in hate. It was the last thing Copperfell did.

With a guttural, nearly-inhuman roar, Annek ripped the towel bar from the wall and caught him full in the eye with the corner of the wall attachment. The weak, tinny metal tube collapsed from the impact.  
>He didn't feel pain anymore; it was burned away as the only thing he had ever wanted and would ever want was to see this man die screaming. Copperfell toppled backwards, breaking his back on the thick ceramic rim of the tub. It was a terrifying crack that seemed to reverberate in the close, cold tiled walls of the bathroom. He slid forward, his knees crashing into the tile. Instead of separating from the wall at the screw, the weak corner of the wall attachment had snapped; there was a dull edge on the bar Annek held. He turned and drove the metal into Copperfell's exposed and waiting stomach, through the stained shirt.<p>

The twisted metal crumpled even further, but the damage was done. Copperfell gurgled weakly and lay still, eye staring, as his life pooled thickly on the floor, warmth seeping into the tile and Annek's toes. Annek spat on his slack face, more blood than saliva. He ripped the bar out, pulling Copperfell forward and onto his face with a soft crunch, but Annek paused, and the gory metal held aloft faltered.

Quick as a match flame, the adrenaline, rage and primal urge to survive driving him were swiftly ebbing away, and as they left, the pain from his injuries and strains slithered up, overwhelming. His right arm hung uselessly; it was dislocated when he'd freed himself. He wanted with every fiber of his being to annihilate Copperfell, to leave nothing of him but a bloody heap of meat, but the fear of being found by more like him was spreading, threatening to lock Annek into place and leave him helpless again. He would not be helpless again. He threw the bar down onto the body in front of him and made his exit.

He limped naked down three flights of steps, out of the apartment and into the elevator. His legs finally gave out beneath him and he hit the glossy brass rail as he went down. He felt a muffled crack in his side and the last sight he saw was the petrified face of the Avox, a slim girl who looked exactly like June when she was younger, but with thin, mousy brown hair.

~~~ReR~~~

His vision was watery and blurry, and he could barely open his eyes. The left was swollen shut, and the right was getting there.

He was nearly incoherently high on something.

He shrank back into the soft pillow and tried to fend off the alien figures hovering over him with an outstretched hand. He found he wasn't actually moving at all -his hand was still resting on the blanket- and there was something thick and cold and slimy in his throat that he was gagging on.

Fresh panic set in. He was either feeling or remembering the sharp weight of shins on his shoulders, hands prying his forehead back and his jaw open as feet dug into his sides.

He heard her (was it a her?) saying something- shouting painfully loudly, and another voice responding, but the words washed over him, incomprehensible. Pressure on his chest and arm, and his vision exploded into stars of bright, incinerating pain. He screamed as much as one could, wrenching away to his left.

He broke as he lost whatever hope he had left, feeling his tears as they slipped between swollen lids and slid stinging across broken skin into the pillow. He couldn't do this again. Something beside him beeped faster and faster, and more voices, urgent now. He felt an ice cold rush in his other arm and blackness overtook him.

~~~ReR~~~

"Annek, it's time to wake up now. Can you open your eyes for me?" He heard his mother calling his name. Wait- not his mother. The voice was sweet and high, like hers, but something was off about it. The timbre? No... Instead of Four's soft drawl, it had a hint of the harsh, hissing Capitol accent.

He opened his eyes, (or at least as far as the right one would open) blinking from the too-bright lights overhead. He saw Meghan's face; drawn with worry, eyes bright with tears, and she said, "Annek, can you hear me?"

He tried to nod, but felt something jammed down his throat stopping him. He gagged instinctively and reached up to rip it out. She held his hand away, and for an instant, he could have killed her.

"Annek, you're safe, it's just a tube to help your breathing, it won't hurt you, I promise," she soothed, rubbing gentle circles into the hand she held.

He calmed himself with some difficulty as he realized he had to breathe through the tube, not around it, and she moved to sit on the narrow hospital bed beside him. She went to stroke his face, or rest a gentle hand on his shoulder, but settled on the left hand that she was already holding, avoiding IV tubes and catheters and the fingertip oximeter; it was the one place he wasn't black and purple or covered in crisp white RapiSet plasters- temporary casts that protected open wounds until the medics could work their magic.

"They've got you on a lot of morphling, darling," Meghan was explaining. "You're here in hospital, until they can get you back to surgery. You've still got a flail chest and a punctured lung, and a lot of organ damage. The medics had to see how bad the concussion was before they could put you under-" Meghan paused, as if realizing none of what she was saying would make sense to him. When she spoke again it was soothing and earnest and quiet.

"But you'll be okay, Annek, all right? You'll go to sleep, and you'll wake up, and everything will be fine, I promise. I won't" -she swallowed- "I won't let anything else happen to you."

He saw white-coated figures watching read-outs on wall-mounted monitors behind her. She stroked his hand, and he tried to focus, to form a sentence in his mind to ask her what was going on, but between the morphling and the crushing, suffocating pain he could only grasp one or two fragments of things at a time. The whole picture eluded him, simply slipped through his fingers. By the time he remembered who the woman beside him was, he'd forgotten why he was here, why he hurt. By the time he remembered that, he'd forgotten Meghan. He'd never felt pain like this, not even in the Arena. It was like his entire body was disintegrating, tearing itself apart. He gave up, and closed his eye.

~~~ReR~~~

He woke up on his own in a quiet, softly-lit room, without that damned tube, and sat up gingerly, touching his face. It was sticky from tape. He still hurt terribly, but his nose felt as straight as ever, though the dream in which it was smashed over to the side and left a hole in his face felt so real. He felt the scar from the Games on his cheek, and was disappointed that it was still there. He was all over bruises, as far as he could see, but they were a sick yellow and brown; old and fading.

He tried to get out of the narrow, high bed, dangling his legs over the edge and bracing himself to slide over the edge, but small hands pulled him back down from behind and he nearly jumped out of his skin, heart galloping and fingers grabbing for the railing in a white-knuckled grip, legs kicking and scrabbling for purchase in thin air.

"Oh, no you don't," Meghan warned him, holding him down as he slowly relaxed, remembering where he was and who she was. "Where are you trying to go?"

"Water," he croaked, and she filled a plastic cup for him. He drank it eagerly as she watched him worriedly, and held the small cup out for more.

She hesitated, and then refilled it. He drained half of it and lay back again, dizzy. Maybe it was just his imagination, but he couldn't get the taste out of his mouth; bitter and salty, mingling with copper and bile.

He traced the IV tubes leading from his arm up to the gaggle of bags hanging half-empty on the rack. One red and one hazily translucent; blood and ringer's solution- blood without the blood cells, according to the label. A smaller one, milky white, full of antivirals and antibiotics. A fourth one attached to a morphling drip, explaining why everything became dreamlike and slid by inconsequentially if he didn't pay special attention. There was a small remote tucked beside him, marked only with an up arrow and a down arrow. Curious, he pressed down twice and soon after the grinding pain notched up considerably. He hastily clicked it back up to where it was before.

"How did I get here?" His voice was still rasping, barely above a whisper. His throat was raw; it felt like he'd been screaming for hours.

"Someone pinged emergency services. I'm your emergency contact," she said, too calmly.

"How long have I... been here?" A wave of nausea came over him as he remembered. It wasn't a dream. The monitor's beeps matched his now-racing heart. Meghan squeezed his hand, trying to be reassuring, but he couldn't meet her eyes. He turned his head away from her, towards the window and the drawn curtains, and bit his lip so it would quit trembling.

"Well, ES picked you up early Sunday morning, and it's Saturday evening now." She was carefully neutral.

They were quiet for a while, listening to the steadying beep of the monitor attached to his chest.

"Why did Cop- ...why did this happen?" Although his name was burned into his mind, Annek couldn't bring himself to say it.

"I don't know, Annek, I don't know, but I'm so sorry it did." Meghan was earnest, and squeezed his hand, gently cleared plastered hair from his face. He let her.  
>He didn't know what to feel, or think. He didn't believe her for a moment, that she didn't know. He felt numb.<p>

They lapsed into silence, until a knock sounded on the door. A plump and cheery nurse peeked her head in.

"Mr. Alda, you've got a visitor here," she warbled.

Annek looked at Meghan, startled. She looked him over, pursed her lips, and brushed his unruly bedhead into submission with a brush she produced from her purse. "All right," she called. "Send her in."

Alyssa Twik stepped through, a puffy cupcake of pastel blue.  
>"You're finally awake! We were worried you might never after Wednesday came and went. Of course, there wouldn't be too much difference, you pretty little potato."<p>

Annek just stared at her. She was just the grating desk attendant at the Tower. What was she doing here? How did she know? He felt very exposed, even under the hospital gown and sheets, and pulled the thin coverlet up higher.

"Ms. Sweet, go get a cup of coffee or draw a dress or something. I need to speak to our dear little Annek alone." She met Annek's gaze, not bothering to look in Meghan's direction.

To his surprise and dismay, Meghan just set her jaw and left. "I'll be back in five minutes, Annek," she called, like Alyssa wasn't even there. It sounded more like a threat than anything.

"Mm, better make it ten," Alyssa said with a smile, still staring Annek down.

"No, five will be plenty." A hard edge crept into Meghan's voice that Annek hadn't heard before.  
>He felt a little like a toy being fought over.<p>

As soon as the door clicked shut, Alyssa started reading off of her clipboard, pen in hand, checking off points as she came to them.

"There are a few things we need to discuss. As a Victor, you're expected to entertain your Patrons, not kill them. Now I know it was your first time, and I gather from your condition that Mr. Copperfell -rest his soul- was a little rough. Normally there's a little leniency, but you murdered him in cold blood and he was a personal friend of President Snow, so the consequences will of course be rather strident and you'll be on probation for some months. Really, though, I would have expected this sort of bovine violence from Ten or Eleven."

Annek opened his mouth to protest, but Alyssa held up two stubby blue fingers and shushed him.

"I know what you're going to say, 'But Miss Twik! I didn't like him!'" She pulled an exaggerated face.  
>"I don't know if the Districts are just breeding simpletons now or what, but your job is very, very easy. Make the people who pay for your company happy. They've paid for your time- I don't know why, I can't wait get away from all of you by the end of the day- and it's your job to indulge them. Not that hard."<p>

"No one told me any of this!" Annek blurted. He hurt and was high and none of what she was saying made sense.

"That's no excuse, but just so I don't have to hear it again, let me spell things out for you," Her words were sharp, but her voice never wavered from its treacly, unctuous tone. "You are a Victor. You're in the Capitol to pay back your debt to President Snow. You do this by entertaining your Patrons. Take them to dinner and a show, sleep with them, walk their dog, spar with them, whatever they decide. You do this with a smile and act like whatever they're asking is all you ever wanted to do. You keep strict confidentiality agreements. Breathe a word of your arrangement or the names of your Patrons, or harm them in any way, and you forfeit the pardon extended to you as Victor. "

"What?" he asked dumbly.

Alyssa let out an exasperated huff and pinched the bridge of her nose between two fingers, the giant green ring perched on her index sparkling in the soft light.

"What I'm trying to get through your thick, waterlogged head is that you belong to the Capitol, and you should act accordingly. I know it's hard for you, but do try not to be quite so thoroughly dense. Instead of killing you in the Arena as was his right by the Treaty that ended the Dark Days, you're a Victor by the grace of President Snow, and now, your job is repaying him for the privilege. Are we clear?"

Annek could only nod.

"I knew I could do it!" She was positively beaming with pride.

"When am I going home?" He didn't want to ask her, but it popped out before he could stop himself.

"I'd imagine whenever you stop playing at Snow White and expecting Ms. Sweet to wake you up with a kiss. I'll make sure there's a limo." She glanced at him, and did a double take at his expression of disbelief. Then burst into a fit of giggles.

"Oh, you precious little peacock, you're not going back to your District, to the Tower! Did you not hear a word I just said?"

She took his crestfallen face as understanding, and seized the moment to shove her bejeweled pen into his right hand and scrawl his signature for him on the line at the bottom of the clipboard. His heart crashed in his chest as she grabbed him, and he focused more on getting away from her than what she was doing. When she dropped his hand, she wiped her own and the pen on his sheets.

"Okay! Well, we still haven't decided, but I'll let you know soon what the terms are of your probation. Given the circumstances, you should probably consider most of your goodbyes permanent. I think we're done here, and just in time for your friend, too. Toodle-oo!"

She swanned out of the door, smacking Meghan with the clipboard on her way out. Meghan waved an obscenity at the retreating figure and returned to her chair by his bed. She looked at him, really looked, and started rambling about nothing in particular so he didn't have to speak.

He knew he ought to feel something, or say something, but he couldn't. There was a yawning abyss inside him, and it was tempting to let it swallow him whole. He turned gingerly on his side, away from Meghan, and curled up into as much of a ball as he could. He pressed the up arrow again and again and again, until it beeped quietly and he slipped away into a fizzy nothingness.

~~~ReR~~~

He left the hospital the next day in comfortable clothes he'd never seen before, with an armful of jars of BruiSerum and as a miracle of modern medicine.

Meghan didn't let him out of her sight until he inquired as to whether she'd be watching him shower, not unkindly. She left him alone with a promise that she'd be back later that night, and keyed in her emergency id to his console. His breath hitched in his throat as he sighed in relief- on one hand, he was glad for the break from her overbearing protectiveness; on the other, he was terrified of being alone. He felt naked and vulnerable, feeling eyes on his back, looking around every so often, into the corners of the spacious, deserted apartment. It was too quiet here. Too big and too quiet and he wasn't safe anywhere.

After a scalding shower with the curtain open, he smoothed on an entire jar of BruiSerum, his warmed, damp skin making it melt and ooze. First the thick, discolored ring around his shoulder, then the bracelets of yellow and brown and green around that wrist. The wide, dark blotches covering his sides, his chest, his back, his legs, his neck, the swollen sockets of his eyes. He looked worse after, bright pink cream highlighting each one.

Tittering nurses had offered to do it before he left the hospital. A gaggle of them had gathered their courage together and filed into his room, laughing and nudging each other, pushing one forward. She'd tried to get the offer out, but fell into a fit of nervous giggles and hid her face in her hands. It had taken everything for him to decline politely and not throw a screaming fit. He couldn't stand the idea of people touching him, of seeing the evidence etched in his skin. Of them knowing what Copperfell had done to him. Even thinking of it now cowed him, made his face burn and his stomach drop, and he reminded himself that he was alone; no one was watching.

You should consider all your goodbyes permanent. There were too many ways to take that. Were they going to kill everyone? Keep him here forever? It wasn't fair at all.

~ReR~

Time passed.

A day went by, with no word from Alyssa.

A week.

A week and a half.

Two.

A month.

A month and a half.

A small and fervent hope grew unbidden- maybe he was forgiven?

He'd been to visit three more Patrons in that time. The first was a girl, a ball of nerves and self-consciousness. Evidently this was her first foray into this world as well. She was so young. Couldn't have been older than fifteen, and he felt filthy even looking at her as she'd paid him to. She was pretty enough, though, and gentle kisses on her palm trailing upwards had eased them both in. He left her to wake up alone.

The second he was no more comfortable with. She was Meghan's age, and had confidence to spare, shoving him on the bed and taking what she'd paid for, nearly giving him a heart attack in the process. He'd kept his composure and regained the upper hand, but the laughing fool had no idea how close she'd come to just being left in those handcuffs.

The third time, Jacques slipped a pale lavender tab into Annek's palm at a Party. He didn't realise what it was for until he met his Patron, a strapping, dark-haired boy close to his own age. Annek swallowed hard, and once they were in a hotel room undressing each other, he slipped the bittersweet tab under his tongue. It wasn't that he was repulsed; he could find a peculiar sort of beauty in the boy, if he tried, and hands were hands and mouths were mouths, soft and inviting. It was fine, until the boy flipped him onto his stomach, and for a second, fear sparked through him. By then, though, whatever he'd taken was making him feel amazing and the boy was skillful and warm and laid little kisses on his shoulder and his neck and the boy's hands felt so nice as they snaked around his thighs and pulled his hips back. He didn't care at all, even impulsively kissed the boy an ardent goodbye, until he'd gotten back and the drug wore off, and he went to pieces in the shower and Meghan put him to bed with a strong sedative.

They all left him seeing Copperfell looming in every corner. It was punishment enough, but he held it together until he was back in his own rooms and then locked himself in his bedroom closet. It was the only place with no windows, with solid walls and a handle he could shove a chair under. He slept there, with a pillow and a thin blanket, curled up in the far corner.

~ReR~

And then June's letter came, hand-delivered by Alyssa. She dropped it into his outstretched hands with a "You'll be on probation for about a year. Consider yourself lucky!" and pranced off.  
>Dread overtook him, then. He put the letter on the kitchen table. He sat staring at it, biting his nails, rubbing the scar on his cheek, hoping without hope that it was unrelated. Maybe a forgery? No, that was June's handwriting, clear as day. The postmarked date was over a month ago.<p>

He tore it open and set it down again, avoiding reading any of it. It would have to be done, he knew, but he... couldn't. He went over to the Dashboard for the apartment and found Meghan in the contacts, sending a one-line message to her emergency ID.

The letter, unfolded, lay on the table- one sheet written closely front and back. He hunted down a bracing shot of Scotch. He skimmed the last line, heart in his throat.

Marcus needs his brother. I need you here. Come home. -J.

He tried again, a little further up. Suspected smuggling ring. No funeral.

His blood turned to ice water. Mom, Dad and Parker are dead.

He froze as the world shrank down to the letter in front of him. It couldn't be. His parents were the planet he orbited around. They had always been there. Would always be. Without them, without his mother's ribald, good-natured jokes and his father's quiet, steady company he was lost. Even now, he couldn't quite comprehend it. Key would not fit to lock. He read the entirety very carefully, in order this time. Then again. And again.

He was sick all over the table. He felt like he couldn't breathe, drawing ragged, ineffectual gasps, and his heart in his chest felt like it was hammering out words. Youdid thisyou didthis youdid.

Meghan came up within an hour of him pinging her. She didn't bother waiting to be let in, knowing the code for his door. She found him deadly still at the table, hollow-eyed, cowed and despairing. He turned towards the sound of her heels clacking on the slate, then clicking on the wood.

He looked at her face and in an instant-

"You knew."

His voice was thick with betrayal.

"What could I have done, Annek?" she pleaded.

"You could have told me," he said, desperate to shift the crushing burden of blame. "You could have warned me. You could have- you could have told me so I wouldn't have killed Co- him." His voice rose until it was high and choked.

"Annek, I wasn't allowed to. And it wouldn't have changed a thing," she said quietly. "Even if you had known, be honest- would you really let someone do that to you, and then let them walk away?"

The truth of her words struck home, and the fight went out of him abruptly, like a light switched off, a balloon burst. She reached a tentative hand out to his shoulder, but he shook it off violently. He rose and locked the door to his bedroom, feeling her eyes on his back.

He cleaned himself up like he was in a dream, without a thought for the mess he left on the table. He turned out the lights, drew the curtains, crawled under the covers of his bed, and tried very hard to die.

~~~ReR~~~

He visited Snow the next day, planning... something. He had a whole speech thought out, scathing and irrefutable, but it died on his tongue the moment Annek saw him. He lunged across the wide onyx desk, reaching to tear Snow's throat out with his bare hands, and found himself staring up at the bright copper ceiling through dazzling stars in his vision, gasping for the breath that had been knocked out of him. Two peacekeepers glared at him, towering like giants.

"Blood for blood, Mr. Alda," Snow was saying. "Take this as a lesson. Everything has a price, and you should reconsider your actions if you're unwilling to pay it." Snow was as calm and cold as a frozen pond.

The peacekeepers hauled him bodily to his feet and out the door.

He returned, defeated, to his room, where Alyssa informed him that at the request of their dear President, he would now be receiving Patrons in his apartments, as penance for his assassination attempt, and to "learn the true cost of fame and fortune."

It washed over him without effect. What was one more wave to an already drowned man?

~~~ReR~~~

Annek lay stretched out on the long couch that looked over the sealed pond in his front room, watching the fish swim aimlessly. He was mostly through a fifth of vodka, not bothering with a glass. The events of eighteen months before trudged steadily through his mind, as they often did, and he had no choice but to watch it over and over and over again in his mind's eye, trying with all his might to change the past.

He obviously hadn't learned a thing. None of it was harsh enough to stick, because he'd just condemned the rest of his family to the same death or worse. No sentence had been passed, but they were as good as dead already. And this time, he didn't even have the excuse of ignorance or instinct or self- preservation. No, he'd murdered Marcus and June, the two people he loved the most, for lust. For selfishness. For a relationship that would end badly. For a relationship that never really was in the first place. Even now, the lovesick part of him half-heartedly tallied up the pros and cons of it. He couldn't even say he'd do things differently, given the chance. Julia and the time he had with her burned too brightly to forsake, a halogen torch in endless night, a bracing shot of cold, clean air in a stuffy, overheated room. The price for her was much too much to bear, but the alternative was just as impossible.

It was a fine line between self-pity and self-loathing, and Annek was draped across it. He flirted with the idea of morphling, though he was half-pickled already; he didn't actually think he could get up if he wanted to. He'd been drinking steadily since he'd gotten back, and that was a good few days ago, now. He drank until he slept. Woke, stumbled to the bathroom, then drank again, still sodden from the day before. Stubble grew into a patchy beard. His Avox had gingerly picked up the bottles and only shook his head sadly when Annek demanded he replace them with full ones. He returned instead with a glass of cool water and a plate of food, replacing them with fresh ones when he came by again. Annek was still there, unmoved.

He rolled off the sofa, picking himself up from a mass of limbs and joints, carelessly walking across the pond cover. "Walking" was a euphemism for what he was doing, a pitching fall forward stopped by a foot, another shambling step. He reached his destination, yanking the drawer open and reaching a hand inside, feeling the smooth and cool vials of silvery metallic liquid. His fingers closed around two or three and he started the journey back.

Annek heard a sharp, stern knock on the door. He ignored it as he collapsed onto the sofa, pushing the vials into the cushion out of instinct. He fumbled for and sipped from the bottle, not tasting the burn. Another knock. He watched passively. Another knock, accompanied by a muffled, angry "I know you're there, Annek. Open the door."

He didn't move as he heard her tap-tap-swipe, the chime of the door and saw Meghan as she stepped through, looked around, caught sight of him, recoiled at the smell.

"What are you doing?"

Her voice was cold. She hadn't forgiven him yet. Well, that was okay, he didn't forgive her either. He slurred an incomprehensible string of curses.

Meghan caught one or two and was incensed. "Don't even start with me right now. I told you in no uncertain terms on the train to Four why getting involved with some girl there was a horrible idea even if you kept it quiet, and you openly defied the Capitol with it! You practically dared him to do something! Do you have any idea what kind of shit I've been going through trying to keep your family alive while you're sitting here wallowing? Do you?"

He mumbled, and sipped.

"Man up already, Annek. Accept some goddamned responsibility for your actions for once and stop running away."

She'd never spoken to him like this before, and it stung.

The bottle arced, seemingly in slow motion, tumbling end over end towards her face. He didn't actually remember throwing it. She dodged it easily and it shattered on the slate behind her, splashing liquid and glass everywhere. The fish darted at the impact.

She stared at it, and then him in livid disbelief. Her heels clicked sharply as she advanced and she slapped him hard across the face.

"You will never do anything like that again, do you understand me?"

Annek stared at her dumbly, wide-eyed and frozen, before his face crumpled like a dead tree finally collapsing into the waiting arms of its brothers.

It wasn't the vodka, or the slap, or her tone (Meghan had never sounded so much like his mother and he had never missed his mother so much), or her words, but the crushing despair of what his life had become. It was the injustices, the mistakes, the myriad cruelties, the daily degradations and the fact he could never seem to even just break even. It was the fact any shred of happiness he managed to claw out for himself was fickle, and fleeting, and followed with tenfold death or pain or both, and would always be.

He didn't know who he was anymore. Every Patron he entertained- every smile and every kiss, every growled "I love the way you look at me"- took another tiny piece of himself far, far away. He didn't know what was left. He didn't really want to.

It hit him as hard as she did, and he looked so utterly broken as he curled his long limbs up into a forlorn ball that Meghan moved to comfort him instinctively, ire dissolved by pity in an instant. He clutched her skirts like a drowning man and hid his face in the crook of her arm as she took her place beside him on the sofa. She rubbed his back and shushed him, trying to soothe away the grief that made his shoulders shake.


	21. Ten and a Half Carat Smiles

Meghan adjusted Annek's bowtie, and after a moment of critical inspection, brushed a piece of lint off his shoulder.  
>"You look good. Be proud of me," she said.<p>

Annek smirked.

"You need to sell this, Annek. Get a tabloid write-up or at least some attention there, and convince him that that girl doesn't mean anything to you. It's the only way to salvage this," she said, holding his gaze.

Annek nodded once, taking a deep breath. It was his first excursion since his sudden, sodden arrival back to the City, and appearances needed keeping up. He squeezed her arm gently.

"I don't even need you to wish me luck," he said, an easy bravado slipping into his voice.

Meghan pushed him out the door with a grin, shutting it behind him.

~ReR~

It was around six when his limo pulled up to the scrolled iron gates of the palatial White home. They opened slowly and Annek took in the gold-traced marble lions, sentinels to the tree-lined drive up to the house. The sheer extravagance gave him goosebumps. No wonder Glinter turned out the way she did.

Glinter took her sweet time, and Annek waited patiently, pre-gaming like a gentleman. He was only halfway through his first glass of brandy when she appeared, the doors held open by Avoci. They lent her a hand as she tottered down the steps. She was a turned-over martini glass of shimmering scarlet: the huge skirt was one and a half times as wide as she was tall, the brilliant color contrasting his simple, all-black tuxedo and clean, freshly shaven face. If it was one thing the Capitol held dear, it was fashion. Unlike daily life, tradition demanded more austere clothing to take in _les beaux arts_- ballgowns and tuxedos were _de rigeur_. It was all very prim and proper, a throwback to times long gone.

She crammed herself and her gown into the spacious back seating area. With the tulle taking up most of the available space, Annek fought down a sudden, small pang of claustrophobia. He took another gulp of brandy and rested his fingers on the handle of his door.

Glinter was breathlessly gushing. She'd switched the date from opera to ballet at the last moment, and this one came highly recommended by Frill.  
>"Apparently, the first act is the most beautiful thing she's ever seen, and even though the second act gets a little weird, she won't stop pestering me until I see it."<p>

"Which one is it?" Annek tried not to be visibly bored, but he was tired of hearing about Frill. The girl was exhausting and he'd only met her once. He knew he needed to bring himself to heel and indulge Glinter, but he back in Four, on the water, watching the sunrise.

"Giselle, I think? It's whichever is the oldest ballet ever performed."

He perked up. "Who's the artistic director?" That phrase reminded him of a conversation he'd had a while ago. If it was who he hoped, the night might not be a total loss.

"Oh, I dunno. Does it really matter?"

"Not really." Annek didn't feel like explaining.

He stared out the window, ignoring her, watching the city go by and dreaming of Julia. It should be her beside him right now, not Glinter. He imagined her warm in his arms, his hands running through her curls, watching her eyes light up at the city...

The limo pulled up to the theater and Glinter and her gown disembarked. Annek gathered himself, arranged his face in a debonair smile, and joined her. They merged into the throng of ballet-goers milling about before the performance. He signed autographs, made small talk. He and Glinter posed for the paparazzi, Annek being careful to loop an arm around her waist, or lace his fingers with hers. He murmured in her ear, turning them so it looked more salacious than it was, the illusion helped along by Glinter's tittering giggles and hand over her mouth. At last, they moved off the carpet and into the sprawling marble lobby for another round of chitchat and introductions to the wide-eyed elite. Annek threw a casual arm around Glinter's shoulders (no small feat, given the yard of tulle standing in the way) and lead her to their seats. There, they came across Jacques, his date, and another Victor couple, exchanging hugs and yet more introductions of their Patrons. Recognition crossed Jacques' face at Glinter's name, but he said nothing. The orchestra began to warm up, and the lights dimmed.

The serene announcer's voice filled the air. "Ladies and gentlemen, please take a moment to turn your attention to the Victor's Box, where we have attending tonight three very special guests; Jacques Henri, Annek Alda, and Phoebe Masterson!" Instead of Panem's anthem, it was customary to announce Victors who were there, the better to compare notes with one's friends and coworkers.

They stood, waved and smiled while their dates sat quietly. Polite applause filled the theater, as well as murmurs and the occasional shout of an over-eager fan. They took their seats again, and the show began.

The first act was truly a feast for the eyes. There were costumes made entirely of jewels, nearly blinding under the stage lights, live animals on stage during the hunt, and pyrotechnics. The show notes explained the premise: Giselle was a district girl of surpassing beauty, but cursed with a frail heart. She danced like the wind, and the ballerina playing her elicited several rounds of applause, pulling off impossible acrobatics and feats of stamina that made Annek get winded just looking at her. Giselle soon fell in love with a Capitol boy named Albrecht, and their duet brought tears to Glinter's eyes. However, the boy's betrayal was soon uncovered: he was engaged to someone else in his own city. Even though he promised himself to Giselle, he couldn't marry her. Albrecht began a much more showy dance with the Capitol fiancée, and poor Giselle lost her mind. Her frail heart gave out, and she died in a spectacular display that brought the house to its feet as the curtain closed.

During intermission, Glinter was cozying up to Annek, sighing and daydreaming over the glancingly romantic parts. Draping herself over him as much as her gown would allow, she was practically in his lap as she whispered sweet nothings in his ear.

"You know, if we were together, I'd never leave you." She slipped her arm through his, entwining her slim fingers in his rough ones.

"Aw, how sweet," Annek replied absentmindedly. He was lost in thought.

"No, I mean it. I really love spending time with you. I wouldn't say no if you asked me, you know, to be yours. I make a good girlfriend." She was coy, dropping her eyes and glancing up at him, pushing her ample chest out and resting it on his arm.

"Is that so." He flipped through the show notes, looking for the name of the artistic director. Stylists dabbled in everything from plays to fashion shows in the off-season, practicing for the Hunger Games, and the story couldn't just be a coincidence. A shared look and he knew Jacques felt the same way. Even Phoebe looked a bit uncomfortable, holding hands with her companion, a tall, angular fellow who kept glancing at her with a secret smile.

Glinter's hand snaked inside his jacket and traveled south into his cummerbund, fumbling with the button to his pants, and she let her lips ghost across his neck as she murmured, "It's true."

Annek flinched away. He snapped out of his thoughts and disentangled himself, less than gently.

"Glinter, we're in public." A hint of disgust crept in.

"So?" she laughed, redoubling her efforts. He grabbed her hand and shoved it away from his lap.

"So stop." He looked at her with incredulity.

"Why? It's just a bit of fun. And it's more private here than in the lobby. " Her voice was low, and she tried again, unzipping his zipper.

"For fuck's sake!" he hissed. He shoved her away and hastily rezipped it. His heart was racing. The comfortable, open balcony felt like it was closing in, and a cold sweat beaded on his face. He fought the urge to get up- to get away from her. He struggled to keep his face neutral, staring down to the crowd below._ She's not him. She can't hurt me. She's not him._

Jacques kept his head forward, but he watched from the corner of his eye.

Glinter sat back, first hurt, then peevish. She crossed her arms and then flopped back into her seat, pouting. "Killjoy." She looked exactly like the spoiled, self-absorbed, myopic, idiotic child she was and Annek lost his patience.

"I'm _so sorry_ for not wanting to be obscene in front of a theater full of people. _Pardon me_ for not wanting to offend my friend who is sitting not three feet from you. How very dare I not want to be a toy for you to play with when the mood strikes you," he spat in a whisper. The initial reaction faded away, subsumed by anger.

He got out of his chair and walked towards the door of the Victor's Box, leaving a gobsmacked Glinter in his wake.

"Where are you going?" she called after him.

"Bathroom." He didn't turn to look at her.

There was a long line, and he checked his watch. Only seven minutes until the second act, and the line was at least twenty, given the number of preening fools who needed to powder their noses or adjust their wigs, self-consciously checking their compact mirrors or touching their hair as they chatted. He sighed and returned to his seat. When he sat down, Glinter didn't look at him. He didn't really care. He had himself in hand, and he couldn't wait to be rid of her. Meghan's admonition was insistent in the back of his mind, however, and he was determined not to banjax this on the heels of the flaming ruins he made of his visit to Four.

She was fawning over Jacques now, to his bemusement and his date's irritation. She kept glancing over to watch Annek's reaction, which was to watch her with total apathy, if not silently egg her on. It was a transparent bid to make him jealous, and he wasn't biting.

"Wasn't the first act just lovely?" Glinter adjusted the lapel on Jacques' jacket, letting her shiny red-lacquered fingers linger on the fabric.

"Yes, it was." The pinched-looking woman on Jacques' left answered for him, laying claim with a hand on his knee.

Jacques shot him a look, half-amusement, and half-helpless. He looked a little like a deer caught between two mountain lions. Annek sighed.

He got up again, smoothing his jacket, and stood by the door.

"Glinter, could I talk with you out in the hall for a moment?" He tried to make his voice as pleasant and honeyed as possible.

This being the effect she was looking for, she smiled. "Of course, Annek, just a moment." She held up one dainty finger, barely even turning his way.

He jammed his hands in his pockets and rocked slightly, impatient. He was not fond of letting her think she'd won.

She turned to Jacques. "It's been wonderful chatting with you. We should get together sometime; I think it'd be fun."

Jacques offered a pale smile and turned and whispered to his date, his hand across hers, lacing their fingers together.

She gathered up her skirts and swanned out of the balcony. "Annek," she said, beckoning.

He rolled his eyes and followed her. He felt a bit silly for his reaction. It had happened ages ago, so why did it still affect him so vividly?

Out in the hall, she crossed her arms, expectant.

"Look. I'm sorry for snapping at you," he began. "It's just, I don't like being touched like that, especially after I asked you to stop. You're a lovely girl, and I know you just want to have fun. It's a fun night," he said, putting as much sensitive, soulful, we're-having-a-moment-and-really-connecting emotion into his voice as he could.

"I'm sorry. I'll try to behave myself." Glinter looked duly chastised.

"Just… save it for later, hm?" He meant it as a joke, but Glinter's eyes lit up and her face was a mask of excitement.

He resigned himself to a longer night than he had originally planned for.

"And really, like jumping all over Jacques would get me jealous," he murmured as he kissed her forehead, running a thumb across her jaw. 'I'd have to care first' was left unspoken. He found her hand and led her back inside, switching seats so Jacques wouldn't have to sit by her.

Just in time, as it was. The lights flickered the end of the intermission and the second act began.

It was starkly different from the first. Gone were the lush, over-stuffed set pieces, the excesses of props and people. The show notes explained that Giselle was now a Wili, a spirit who was engaged but died without being married, and forced unlucky men caught in the woods at night to dance to their deaths.

The only thing on the black hole of a stage was a stone cross marking her grave. Myrta, Queen of the Wilis, appeared: ethereal, ghostly, and altogether otherworldly. She was clad a brilliant white dress of gauzy tulle that caught the air as she twirled and a hard, fierce crown of cold diamonds that caught the light. Her pale skin was glowing blue. She called forth a legion of Wilis, dressed identically, with circlets instead of crowns.

It was fearful to watch as first one man, and then another and another and another danced and spun until he collapsed and died. Giselle appeared, glowing even brighter than the others. When her veil was pulled off, she leapt into movement that was even faster and more complex than the first act. She was strikingly beautiful, released from the bonds of a heart that refused to keep up. Soon the others joined in, a mad whirl of tulle. Annek looked more closely. It wasn't that she was brighter, but Myrta and the other Wilis were now in deep, deep gray, shadows almost imperceptible against the blackness of the stage.

And then Giselle's beau appeared in the woods, sobbing at her grave. The music, brash and sinister, cut off as Giselle turned her head and noticed him. She stopped abruptly, perfectly balanced on the point of one foot, and the Wilis stopped as well. They watched her as she watched him. Silence reigned in the darkened theater. A fearsome grin appeared on her face, white teeth flashing in the darkness, and she made him dance. Her costume grew dimmer with each passing moment, until it was black as the surrounding stage and she was suddenly outlined in red, an avenging angel of death. Albrecht, her beau, fell to his knees and onto his face, arms outstretched in supplication, pledging that he loved her still. He explained in pantomime that he was trapped in a life that wasn't his, that his heart was hers and hers alone. She wavered, and her dress did as well, flickering from black to gray and back again. He grasped at her fluttering legs. Something changed in her, and she stumbled just once, hands flying out to right herself. Giselle turned to Myrta, pleading for Albrecht's life. Myrta was adamant, with she and all the other Wilis taking on the black, red-lit colorway. They would have his blood.

Giselle's costume grew lighter as she wordlessly pled her case. She forgave him, even though he'd killed her, why couldn't they? The deal was struck- he must dance until sunrise, and if he survived, he was free to go.

Giselle and Albrecht began the tenderest_ pas de deux_, recalling the events of their life together, up to her death and his grief, until she was once again in glittering, shimmering, brilliant white. The dancer seemed reinvigorated once over. She was flying now, expressing immeasurable longing and love and grief in the tilt of her head, the gesture of an arm.

Even with Giselle, Albrecht was tiring, and he collapsed once more. Desperate, Giselle protected him, dancing in his place. All seemed lost until the bells began tolling, signaling the morning that burned the Wilis away.

A final duet_,_ a lovesick farewell, until at last Giselle, too, faded away. Albrecht was left alone and truly free, basking in the gloriously warm light of the sunrise as the curtain fell for the last time.

Annek released the seat arms, and realized his knuckles were white and his hands ached from gripping them. His eyes stung, and he released a breath he didn't know he was holding.

He turned to Jacques, who was cleared his throat. Phoebe was sobbing into the shoulder of her companion.

He took a deep, steadying breath. There was no doubt in his mind, now. It was a message, straight to the heart of Victors trapped in the Capitol._ Hope._

Glinter had enjoyed it, but she shared Frill's opinion that it was an anticlimactic ending.

"Giselle should have just killed him with the others. What was the point in letting him live? She didn't even get revenge!"

Annek held his tongue, but suggested they go to the stage door.

They went, fighting against the flow of people wanting to go home. Jacques and his date, a woman by the name of Holly, accompanied them.

When they reached the back door, there was a small but excitably excited crowd already there. Annek and Jacques were a welcome distraction from staring at the stage door waiting for it to open. They were quickly mobbed with a rush of chattering theater-goers looking for opinions and poignant summaries to parrot over coffee to their friends. Annek and Jacques held court, trading witticisms and cracking jokes, slipping into an easy rhythm as they made small talk with each other and the crowd, waiting for the dancers and directors to emerge. It was a toss-up between Glinter and Holly as to who looked more proud to be on a Victor's arm, and they got their share of glares filled with envy. Glinter drank it in, smiling from ear to ear.

Eventually the dancers came out, long and lean. They bowed and posed gracefully for the flash of cameras. They recognized Annek and Jacques, arranging themselves in front of the pair. They cupped their hands over their hearts, before sweeping the elegant knuckles of one hand and the smooth fingertips of the other across the rough pavement; the deepest curtsy and highest honor they could give. They straightened and turned to the others in the crowed, waving quickly before slinking off into the night as a group. It was only then that Annek realized they were Avoci. Dancing was the only way they could speak. The crowd dispersed soon after, leaving Jacques and Annek there with Holly and Glinter, who were getting impatient.

Cinna appeared, and Annek wore a wide grin. He had been right after all. During the party where he had first met Glinter, he and Cinna had spent a good while talking. Cinna had mentioned that he was working on a ballet that would debut in a few weeks. Annek had all but forgotten until Glinter had mentioned it.

"Annek!" he called, returning the smile. "So glad you could come see our little show."

Annek introduced him to Jacques, the 56th Game's Victor from One, and Annek's personal friend and practical mentor.

"It was beautiful." Jacques couldn't find the words to express what he felt, so he settled for two. "Thank you."

"The day you picked up a needle and thread was the day the Capitol fell," Annek said, and Jacques cast him a sharp glance.

"What do you mean?" Holly asked, her dull, whining tone setting Annek's teeth on edge. He pitied Jacques.

"Just that Cinna will probably be the next big fashion designer. You should keep an eye on him. -You've got a new collection coming out soon, right? " Annek tried to cover, turning to Cinna.

"Of course. And I'll make you two custom dresses for your next special outing," Cinna took over. He took Holly's and Glinter's hands in his, his voice warm and earnest, the very picture of an effusive, generous director reveling in a new triumph and trying to share his good fortune. "It's been such a successful night, we have to memorialize it somehow. That seems fitting— to do it with fashion. Doesn't it?" Holly and Glinter were putty and grinned at each other, the earlier skirmish –and Annek's comment— completely forgotten.

"How did you manage to swing art director your first year out?" Annek asked. Cinna was talented, but he was still only a first-year, and not even a real stylist yet.

"I had a stylist with a recent win who put in a recommendation." Cinna winked.

"Meghan Sweet?" Annek didn't realize she knew Cinna.

"The one and only."

Annek made a mental note to talk to her about it.

They all chatted for a little while longer, but Glinter complained of her heels and the constricting corset and the weight of her dress, so Annek took his leave.

Glinter hobbled slowly, leaning on Annek heavily until they reached the limo.

After some deliberation and useless angling on his part, they went back to his rooms. Glinter tottered out of the limo as it idled outside of the Tower, and finally discovered a secret pull-tab that compressed the enormous amounts of tulle into something manageable. Annek carried her to the elevator at her behest, one of her arms draped across his shoulder and her heels dangling off of her toes. Tap-tap swipe on the door, and he set her down on a couch.

They ordered dinner and drinks, Annek giving her a piggy-back ride over to the console to read the menu. Glinter over-indulged on rich food and strong drinks, and soon she was pretty far gone; describing her favorite parts of the first act, complete with wildly waving hands and awful attempts to recreate the dancer's movements. If he was honest with himself, or honest with how much he'd had to drink, Annek was beginning to enjoy her company. Unerring adulation seemed to wear him down. And her intentions were good, weren't they?

He went to get her a glass of water and when he returned, her dress was off and she was lying on the bed in a rough approximation of "sexy".

"Look, it stands up on its own," she giggled. It was true; the dress looked like it was on a mannequin, propped up by the tulle.

"I think you're done for tonight, doll," he laughed. "I'll sleep on the couch, we'll get you some clothes and I'll send your dress on in the morning after it's been cleaned."

"Nooo. That's not what you promiiised." She lost the Capitol accent when she was drunk, lapsing into a faint District One lilt, probably picked up from her parents and proximity to Jacques.

"I don't think you're in any condition for… shenanigans right now. It wouldn't be very gentlemanly of me." Maybe if he kept talking, she'd pass out.

"You owe me, remember? I was so good. And I'll complain right now, I will. Jusswatch." Glinter struggled to stand up on the bed, a wide, silly smile on her face, swaying on unsteady legs. He didn't believe her threats for a second, but it was still a hard dose of reality. _Of course_ she would default to that.

"Fine, fine. Don't hurt yourself. Lie down." Annek gave in and began unbuttoning his cummerbund, his goodwill towards her evaporating. "We're even after this, right? No more threatening to complain?"

"Yupyupyup. My promise." She giggled again and fell back down onto the bed, narrowly avoiding clipping her head on the headboard. Annek winced. He hated it when they were so altered like this, whether on drinks or whatever the new Capitol fad was. But he pulled her to himself (and away from hard corners), and tried to forget, even as it happened. He went through the motions, his hands running over her skin, his body acting and reacting as it needed to. He said what he had to, encouraging here, and vulnerable there, breathlessly complimentary through it all. But his thoughts drifted far, far away, and all he heard was lapping waves against _Evangeline,_ and all he saw was the inviting light of the sea at dawn.


	22. But Who of Us Will Put the Bell On?

Julia was dark and lovely and _warm_ beneath him, wrapping her legs around him as he moved in her. Her long fingers trailed down his back and up into his hair, pulling him down to her, her cheek against his own. Annek breathed her in, reveling in the scent of clean sweat and salt and soft, wild florals lingering on her skin. His fingers dug into the intoxicating curve of her hip, the back of his hand and his knees pressed into the cool sheets beneath her.

He turned his head to find her velvet tongue with his own, but jerked his head away at the sharp stab of pain in his cheek. He opened his eyes and looked down. Instead of Julia, he saw Undine from the island staring up at him. He cried out as fear surged through him, a chemical sting tripping lightly down his nerves. He tried to pull away from her cold, slimy skin, but her claws were digging into him and she lunged up at him, wide mouth open and primed to tear his throat out with needle teeth.

Annek woke up with a start, drenched in a freezing sweat, his heart about to beat through his chest. It was still dark—the room was cold and he couldn't quite see the glass doors of his bedroom a little ways away. He put his hand up to his throat, sure that he would find a milky, translucent, serrated tooth stuck in it, but the skin was still whole. He let out a huge, shaky sigh that roused the figure beside him.

"Annek?" It was froggy with sleep.

He peered over in the dimness, trying to figure out quickly who was beside him. There was a wave of glossy brown hair, and the girl raked it aside to look at him as she sat up on her elbows.

"What's wrong?"

He finally placed the voice when he saw her face. "Nothing, Glinter. Go back to sleep, it's late. -Or early." His voice was shaking, to his surprise. He cleared his throat.

"You're not going to kick me out this time?" She was sitting up now, covering a huge yawn with her hand and rubbing her eyes. She fumbled with the lights, smacking the panel on the wall near the headboard until there was a warm, soft glow filling the room. He tried to settle down, but his nerves were still jangling and raw. It was nice to have someone as dumb and unconcerned as Glinter around right now, though. It was like watching the shopping channel after staying up too late telling ghost stories to scare Marcus; vapid, airy nothingness that assured him nothing too terrible was wrong with the world.

"Well, you're not paying this time, are you?" He flashed her a practiced, irreverent grin and hoisted himself up to get a drink. He didn't bother with a towel or a robe, and Glinter tried and failed not to stare. Annek ignored her, downing one drink and pouring another.

"What's going on?" She crawled out of bed to join him by the dry bar. "Are you okay? You're kind of pale." It sounded more like curiosity than actual concern.

"M'fine." He glanced at her, surprised she was aware enough to notice his mood. He blinked when her hand shot out and nipped the glass out of his own, but he let her take it. Glinter downed the rest of his drink with a wink, trying to be coquettish, but her face screwed up and she coughed hard as the straight whiskey went down. He smirked as she recovered.

"Used to the gentle persuasions of icewine, huh?"

"What _is_ this? Some sort of District drink?" She set the glass down well away from him, appalled.

Annek rolled his eyes. "It's whiskey. Obviously, it's here too, so it's not just from the Districts."

Glinter scoffed. "Clearly they just haul it up here to pacify you people. It's gross."

"Don't steal my drinks, then. And don't ever try cheap vodka," he said, wryly. His tone wasn't as sharp as it could have been.

"Why are we up drinking now, anyway?"

"We're not. I'm heading back to bed. Not sure what you're doing over there."

She grinned and dived back into the still-warm bedclothes, stealing the lion's share of the sheets and comforter.

"You're really letting me sleep over?"

"Not if you keep asking. And definitely not if you hog all the covers." He tugged gently on them, and she let a tiny square of fabric go.

He settled in on his side of the bed, trying to ignore the way she kept creeping over when the lights turned off. But whenever he closed his eyes, he saw the flash of the lunging mouth, could almost feel the sting of claws in his back. His upper arm tingled like the back of his neck did when he felt someone watching. So he curled up behind Glinter and slipped an arm over her, noting with a pang of loss that he liked the way Julia fit with him better. Glinter was too small and her shampoo was too strong and artificial. Still, she was a warm body that drove away the sense memory of chill flesh against his own.

In the morning, he was already showering when she awoke. She took advantage of his absence by sauntering over to the Dashboard and ordering up a breakfast of nearly every possible item, from waffles to eggs benedict to quiches and bacon. He pulled a face when he got to the kitchen, toweling off his hair.

"That's enough food to feed fifteen people, Glinter," he frowned.

"So? It all looks so good! Where's your effluvium bin?"

"I don't keep one around. I don't eat just to taste things." It was a little sharper than it should have been, and he mentally kicked himself. "Old habits, I guess," he lied.

"Oh. Well, you're missing out," she tittered, blithely unaware. "You can try everything, instead of just however much it takes for you to be full."

"Oh, really?" He meant it sarcastically, but it flew over her head, and she nodded enthusiastically. "And the pills don't even hurt. Like, you know how when you're, like, really sick and you feel kind of like you're dying? They don't feel like that. It's just… I don't know. Easy." She shrugged, and shook out her hair.

"Don't worry about it. Maybe some other time I'll try it. Now, though, could you just pick three dishes for us to share? You know, for me? It's too early to try new things like that," he said mostly cheerfully. He was sighing inwardly, trying to keep Meghan's advice in mind. Be boring and she'll lose interest.

She beamed at him indulgently. "Once you try it, you'll never want to go back to just eating to be full again." To her credit, however, she managed to pick a nearly balanced meal from the dishes in front of them, and Annek sent the rest back down to wherever food came from. Glinter speared a fat link of sausage with a fork, skipping the plate and going straight to her mouth as she watched him, and Annek resigned himself to breakfast.

Mercifully, there were only two sausages on the plate. Soon enough, they'd cleared the fruit and waffles away as well, making small talk in between bites of waffle and sips of orange juice and Bellinis.

"Can I use your shower?" Glinter had since stopped being coy, and prancing around in a silky robe had finally lost its appeal.

"You've helped yourself to everything else. I'm leaving in twenty, though, and you're not staying here without me. Make sure you're ready by then or you're leaving as you are, soap in your eyes and all." It wasn't quite teasing, and wasn't quite a threat.

Glinter heeded the warning, and soon they were heading out. Annek wore his normal covert city-wear, but Glinter put on an obnoxiously ostentatious hat to cover the wet bun her hair was twisted in. Sunglasses covered half her face both to hide her identity and titillate the photographers who would no doubt be thrilled catching an overnight guest making the walk of shame from the Tower. The greenish gold lipstick, however, Annek couldn't begin to understand. They made their way out to the street, Annek being a perfect gentleman and hailing her a taxi. When one promptly screeched to a halt in front of them, he opened the door for her. Once she was safely ensconced inside, he pressed his palm to the glass for the briefest moment (just long enough for someone to get a good picture of it, really) and then tapped the side for the cab to peel away. He managed to look smug, triumphant, and wistful at the same time, turning his head so they had the best angle of his face. He turned with a saunter to the photographers. They practically lived outside of the Tower on weekends, trying to capture tabloid fodder for Monday. They stopped snapping pictures once the taxi was well and truly out of sight, and were all eyes and ears once they realized he was still standing there, watching them.

He gave them a cheeky grin. "One question about her."

They exploded in a clusterbomb of voices, shouting over each other.

"Where does she live?"

"Have you been seeing each other?"

"Did you sleep with her?"

"What's her name?"

"Does the carpet match the drapes, or is there hardwood?"

"How old is she?"

"Are you an item?"

"Who is she wearing?"

"Her name starts with a W. Or maybe an H." He winked, and blew a kiss at a buxom photographer with purple hair. She would have dropped her camera if it hadn't been on a strap looped round her neck. He headed off in the other direction for a few blocks, waiting for the paparazzi who followed him to lose interest and go back to haunting the entrance to the Tower. When they left, he hailed a cab for himself to Meghan's office.

He rarely went here anymore. It was in the business commons, far enough away it was a pain to get there. There was a sleek and dramatically appointed waiting room, all deep, dark wood and cream leather. Gardenia and jasmine wafted through the air, warm and seductive. He always felt more reassured of Meghan's general prowess when he came here.

Framed pictures of her Tributes during their presentations hung around the room. A girl from Five, with pin-straight dark hair and a crackling projection of a crown above her head. A boy from Six, nearly subsumed in a fiery phoenix so bright it washed out the background of the picture. A girl from Two, who looked like she was carved from marble, inviting her foes to break themselves upon her. Another girl from Seven who looked like a wood nymph: her skin painted a delicate green, promising mischief, thievery and the undefinable sort of slippery wiles. Annek's picture was just above the receptionist's wide, burnished wood arc of a desk, where it had the most impact. He was sure he hadn't looked that… mean while it was happening, but both he and Doe looked practically feral; sharks impatiently waiting for the bloody melee that followed. His heart gave a sudden, wrenching twist at the small face a little lower than his own, and he found himself staring at those blue eyes that seemed to burn through the glass at him. He shivered, but held his ground. Was she already thinking of trying to kill him then, when they rode side by side? _We do not kill our own._ It was scorched into the hearts of all the District Four children, passed on in whispers from mouth to mouth as the Reaping Day drew close each year, from the oldest boys who saw the bright hope of nineteen on the horizon, to the youngest girls who still played with dolls. When had she decided that that old District Four murmur of rebellion, that scrap of defiance, was worth less than her own life? That his was? He stared hard at those eyes, willing some answer to reveal itself, but they were blank walls of flint, seas brewing storms. And two years dead.

"Mr. Alda?"

It was the receptionist, staring at him. She was a little puzzled, but more starstruck. He shook his head to clear it, and flashed her a wide smile. She blushed.

"I'm here to see Meghan. Normally she makes house calls for me, but I thought I'd return the favor for once," he drawled.

"Oh, right. Yes." She giggled nervously, and visibly strove to be professional. "If you want to have a seat, she'll be out of her meeting shortly."

Annek leaned his arms on the desk, setting his face to 'smoldering'. "I'll just wait here, if that's all right with you. It's a better view."

The receptionist blushed harder. She was his age or a little younger, he figured, and had a swirl of hair that looked like an ice cream cone with candy pieces sprinkled throughout. He vaguely wondered if they were still edible.

"I—em, sure! Just—just if someone comes, I have to talk to them and stuff. Sometimes important people come here," she said, conspiratorially.

"More important than me?" He moved closer, and she leaned in as well.

"Maybe? I don't think so. And definitely not as… as handsome." Her voice dropped, barely making it the short distance to him. Annek reached out a hand, and covered hers where it lay on the desk surface.

"I like it when you compliment me," he cooed, and she practically melted off of her perch.

"I'll do it all day, if you want me to," she sighed.

"What else would you do for me?" he asked, _sotto voce_.

"Annek, stop being an ass to Bedelia," Meghan's voice rang out before the poor receptionist could answer. It wasn't quite sharp, but it wasn't a tone to be ignored. Annek winked at the girl, but drew away quickly and turned to face Meghan, who was standing with a reporter wearing an oxblood suit and heels that looked as if they'd snap her ankles like twigs if she mistepped. She looked heartily amused, but Meghan didn't. Once she had not-quite-glared at him sufficiently, she turned to face the other woman.

"I'll call you soon, Pom, and I promise you have the exclusive." They air-kissed, Pomona stooping a little to get level with Meghan's cheek.

"We'll talk soon, Annek," the woman said, by way of goodbye. Her voice was deep and rich, and Annek realized the gardenia and jasmine wafting around was her. She strode weightlessly to the door and was gone in a flash. He watched the door close behind her, blinking as it shut quietly. He turned to look at Meghan blankly, having forgotten what he had come all this way for. Meghan rolled her eyes.

"You. My office, before you start torturing my staff again." Meghan crooked a finger at him, and Annek grinned, knowing he was forgiven. He followed her back to her office like a puppy, without a glance back.


End file.
